What Happened to the New Solar Cycle?
According to official accounts, the new solar cycle 24 supposedly began this past January, but since then there has not been a peep of activity from #24, instead we continue to see a few spots every now and then from the outgoing cycle #23. Now, it looks like the real start for solar cycle 24 is further delayed.
The sun's sunspot activity remains ultra quiet (April 8th image)
Anthony Watts has a nice post in his blog on the situation in regards to the waiting game on solar cycle 24. Watts has a link to Jan Janssen's Solar Activity and Earth Monitor web page. On his web page, Janssens does not expect solar cycle 24 anytime before July of 2008, and perhaps not till early 2009, which would make solar cycle #23 one of the longest in over 100 years. Keep in mind, his forecast is not the "official" prediction.
Here is the graph (below) of the latest sunspot prediction from NASA.
