Donald Savage
Headquarters, Washington, DC                      March 4, 1999
(Phone:  202/358-1547)

Bill Steigerwald
Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD
(Phone:  301/286-5017)

Annette Trinity Stevens
Montana State University, Bozeman
(Phone:  406/994-5607)

NOTE TO EDITORS:  N99-13

SCIENTISTS TO ANNOUNCE POTENTIAL TOOL FOR FORECASTING ENORMOUS 
SOLAR ERUPTIONS AT MARCH 9 SPACE SCIENCE UPDATE 

       Scientists will announce on Tuesday, March 9, 1999, their 
discovery of a possible way to forecast several days in advance 
the largest and most violent explosions on the Sun's outer 
atmosphere.  The explosions, called coronal mass ejections, are as 
powerful as billions of nuclear explosions and can affect radio 
communications, electrical power systems and satellites orbiting 
Earth.  The announcement will be made at the next Space Science 
Update, scheduled for 1 p.m. EST at NASA Headquarters, Washington, 
DC.   The scientists will discuss how they made the discovery 
using images from the Japanese/U.S. Yohkoh satellite, what we know 
about such explosions, and how this new tool will be used in 
forecasting solar activity and its effects on Earth.

        Panelists will be:
  * Dr. Richard Canfield, Research Professor, Physics Department, 
Montana State University, Bozeman
  * Dr. Sarah Gibson, postdoctoral fellow, University of 
Cambridge, England
  * Dr. David M. Rust, Senior Physicist, The Johns Hopkins 
University Applied Physics Laboratory, Laurel, MD
  * Dr. Alphonse Sterling, solar physicist, Computational Physics 
Inc, Fairfax, VA, where he acts as a contractor to the Naval 
Research Laboratory (NRL), and Yohkoh science team
  *  Dr. George Withbroe, Science Director for the Sun-Earth 
Connections science theme, NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC, 
panel moderator.

       The program will originate from NASA Headquarters 
Auditorium, 300 E St., SW, Washington, DC, and will be carried 
live on NASA TV with two-way question-and-answer capability for 
reporters covering the event from participating NASA centers.  

       NASA Television is broadcast on the GE2 satellite located 
on Transponder 9C, at 85 degrees West longitude, frequency 3880.0 
Mhz, audio 6.8 MHz.  Audio of the broadcast will be available on 
voice circuit at NASA's Kennedy Space Center on 407/867-
1220/1230/1240.

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