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IPS Radio and Space Services - Australian Government

Bureau of Meteorology Space Weather Branch

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Home Site News	FORECAST SOL: Normal MAG: Normal ION: Moderate	Saturday, Feb 04 2012 07:35 UT

Site News

04 Feb 2012 Daily forecast status indicators for solar, geomagnetic and ionospheric conditions can be Green (normal), Yellow (moderate activity) or Red (disturbed). The IPS Space Weather page shows current conditions.

01 Feb 2012 The anticipated significant geomagnetic activity from the CME (coronal mass ejection) associated with the solar flare observed on 23 January was milder than expected, particularly at low-middle latitudes. The CME did impact the Earth in the early morning hours of 25 January (AEST) as forecast accompanied by a relative large change in solar wind speeds, however, the orientation of magnetic field carried with the CME was opposite to that required to produce large storms at lower latitudes. Auroral displays were observed at high latitudes.

30 Jan 2012 Advanced Stand Alone Prediction System (ASAPS) Version 6.1 software patch released for download. This patch is free for existing ASAPS 6 customers and includes improvements and bug fixes to increase the usability and stability of the program.

16 Jan 2012 IPS Culgoora Observatory offline due lighting strike on power lines. The power spike protection system took 2 big hits and we are currently waiting for replacement components before power is restored to the site.

20 Dec 2011 Ground Wave Prediction System (GWPS) Version 4.1 software patch released for download. This patch is free for existing GWPS 4 customers and includes many minor improvements and bug fixes to increase the usability and stability of the program.

09 Nov 2011 An improved version of the online VHF-UHF over-the-terrain area prediction tool is now available. It is now possible to make area predictions using digital elevation model data for the entire Earth between geodetic latitudes 60S and 60N. The user can also chose between four different knife edge diffraction models.

01 Jul 2011 Near real-time magnetograms from Norfolk Island now available.

30 Jun 2011 New GNSS-derived regional Total Electron Content (TEC) maps available through the Satellite page

30 May 2011 Free seminars for space weather effects and BOM/IPS services was hold on 08 June 2011 in Canberra and 22 June 2011 in Perth.

17 May 2011 A prediction tool is now online for calculating RF signal pathloss for VHF/UHF(30mHz - 3GHz) systems over a given area.

19 Apr 2011 New versions of IPS HF prediction software released: ASAPS 6, ASAPS Lite and GWPS 4. ASAPS 6 includes digital HF predictions and real-time T index updates.

07 Jan 2011 New real time services available through the Satellite page: Total Electron Content (TEC) maps, TEC disturbance maps, GPS iono error maps, real-time TEC model comparisons, Ionospheric Scintillation maps

16 Nov 2010 IPS has co-located its head office with the NSW Bureau of Meteorology Regional office in Elizabeth Street Sydney. The current timetable relocating essential computing systems is at 11AM on the 17th November. It is expected that real-time updates to the web server will be unavailable for between 2 and 6 hours during the transition.

14 Oct 2010 IPS has relocated its Mundaring ionospheric observatory in Western Australia to Perth. Data from this ionosonde is now available. Perth ionosonde operational

31 Aug 2010 The gearbox in the Culgoora Solar Observatory H-alpha and white light telescope has been reparied and re-installed. The telescope has returned to solar patrol. back on patrol

11 Aug 2010 The remounting of the Culgoora A band antenna has been delayed due to rain. The recent rain has kept the ground too soft for crane operations. Additional rain over the last few days has further delayed the remount. A band antenna remount delayed