2012 and Planet X Links
Planet X Forecast and 2012 Survival Guide
Chapter 8 — Solar Storm Monitoring
The greatest threat we will face from Planet X (Nibiru, Wormwood) is its interaction with our Sun. After Planet X passes through the ecliptic, we will begin to see violent solar storms as the Sun begins to respond to its presence.
ESA: SOHO
Launch: December 1995
Mission Extended to 2009
New funding, to extend the mission of ESA's venerable solar watchdog SOHO, will ensure it plays a leading part in the fleet of solar spacecraft scheduled to be launched over the next few years.
Since its launch on 2 December 1995, The Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) has provided an unprecedented view of the Sun – and not just the side facing the Earth. Two teams have now developed techniques for using SOHO to recreate the conditions on the far side of the Sun. The new funding will allow its mission to be extended from April 2007 to December 2009. 
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NASA: Stereo
Launch: August 2006
NASA will launch its twin STEREO spacecraft into orbit around the Sun, to provide the first stereoscopic views of coronal mass ejections.
The twin spacecraft, called the Solar TErrestrial RElations Observatory (STEREO), will explore these massive explosions, or coronal mass ejections, which erupt as billowing magnetic storms that can dwarf the sun.
“In terms of space-weather forecasting, we’re where weather forecasters were in the 1950s,” said Michael Kaiser, STEREO project scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. “They didn’t see hurricanes until the rain clouds were right above them. In our case, we can see storms leaving the sun, but we have to make guesses and use models to figure out if and when they will impact Earth.”
Each STEREO observatory, which is about the size of a golf cart, carries 16 instruments in all, including imaging telescopes for optical photos, equipment to measure solar wind and more energetic particles, magnetometers and radio antennas.
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NASA, ESA, JAXA: Solar-B (Hinode)
Launch: October 2006
Our Sun is a violent star and is capable of producing explosive flares and hurling clouds of matter toward Earth, activities that in the past have interfered with satellite communications and electric power transmission grids on Earth.
Solar scientists have found suggestions that extremely small magnetic features in the solar photosphere are responsible for the changes in the luminosity. Solar-B will enable the first comprehensive set of observations to determine the role of these features in long-term solar luminosity changes and provide better answers to this provocative question of how the Sun impacts Earth's climate.
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ESA: Proba-2
Launch: September 2007
Proba-2, currently under development and due for launch in September 2007, is the second in ESA’s series of small, low-cost satellites that are being used to validate new spacecraft technologies while also carrying scientific instruments.
Four experiments are being flown: two for solar observations and two for space weather measurements.
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NASA: Solar Dynamics Observatory
Launch: August 2008
"The SDO mission... will directly contribute to NASA's mission to understand and protect the home planet."
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Mission Goal: Understand the magnetic topologies that give rise to rapid high-energy release processes.
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Tests of critical systems have already begun, in preparation for the full spacecraft assembly, system tests and verification, culminating in an August 2008 launch. The prime observing phase of SDO is planned for five years - half a solar cycle - with the possibility of a 5-year extension.
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ESA: Solar Observer
Launch: 2015
By approaching as close as 45 solar radii, the Solar Orbiter will view the solar atmosphere with unprecedented spatial resolution circa 100km pixel size. Over extended periods the Solar Orbiter will deliver images and data of the polar regions and the side of the Sun not visible from Earth.
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Solar Orbiter is attracting interest beyond Europe and the workshop made a strong plea for international coordination of future solar missions, which was swiftly accepted. The wide attendance from beyond Europe meant that the Inter Agency Consultative Group (IACG) on space science could meet and it was quickly agreed that Solar Orbiter should become a major element of NASA's 'Living with a Star' programme which begins in 2007. However, Solar Orbiter would complement appropriate missions in this programme, especially NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO), if its launch date were brought forward to 2010.
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