Low solar activity = more Noctilucent clouds = interesting evening light show Are y'all seeing them where you live?
Why are they more common at times of low solar activity? All I could find was that we can perhaps expect more of them with more methane emission, as the climate changes.
I noticed them just recently. They looked like snow clouds to me. We're near the shortest nights of the year so there's only a few hours of darkness.
During a solar minimum, noctilucent clouds tend to become more prevalent as this period favors the frosting of meteor smoke high above the Earth. Water molecules stick to specks of meteor smoke, gathering into icy clouds that glow electric blue when they are hit by high altitude sunlight. Extreme ultraviolet radiation (EUV) radiation can destroy those water molecules before they freeze. As a result, less EUV during solar minimum can result in more noctilucent clouds. from https://peratonweather.com/blog/202...-have-been-unusually-prevalent-in-recent-days
That's very interesting about meteor dust. I subsequently found the same thing referred to on the NASA site: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/aim/news/meteor-smoke.html What I didn't find was an explanation of why you get more at a solar minimum - unless I missed it somehow.
yep you missed it it was in the quoted "Extreme ultraviolet radiation (EUV) radiation can destroy those water molecules before they freeze. As a result, less EUV during solar minimum can result in more noctilucent clouds." from that, it seems that the dust is still there just no water thereby no ice thereby no ice clouds .......................... I recently saw a joke about Ikea water guy opens the package and finds 2 canisters of H and 1 canister of O
