Surviva-List
Sunday, September 13, 2026
The Signal
NOAA holds Solar Cycle 25 inside its maximum window this morning, and the electron flux alert over Earth's dayside renews for a third straight day. Millions of people from Iowa to Kent to Tasmania now photograph an aurora their grandparents never saw from home. The same sun that stresses grids is handing out free wonder.
The Brief
Solar Cycle 25 is at peak and the aurora has been visible farther south than at any point in decades. NOAA's electron flux alert renewed for a third consecutive day Saturday. Great Sitkin and Kilauea both sit at aviation code ORANGE. WHO's Bundibugyo virus outbreak in the DRC has now generated a dozen situation reports and surpassed 3,600 confirmed cases. And the deadliest event in the last 48 hours was a ferry, not a fault line.
By The Numbers
1,000 pfu
Electron flux threshold breached, third straight day
NOAA's ALTEF3 alert has run continuously since September 10, the signature of a sun deep inside its maximum and the reason satellite operators are watching charge accumulation this week.
3,626+
Confirmed Bundibugyo virus cases, DR Congo
WHO's cumulative count crossed that line in the August 1 situation report and has climbed through two more updates since, making this the most severe single event in today's global data.
2
US volcanoes at aviation code ORANGE
Great Sitkin in the Aleutians and Kilauea on Hawai'i Island both sit at WATCH, with Shishaldin at YELLOW behind them, a three-volcano posture that is unusual even for Alaska.
60 mph
Wind gusts forecast, Madison River Valley, Montana
NWS Great Falls has a High Wind Warning running until 6 PM Sunday along the Highway 287 corridor, with a separate watch for Judith Basin County opening Monday morning.
“The most democratic scientific instrument on Earth right now is a phone camera pointed north. No fee, no credential, no gatekeeper. Just the sky, showing up.”
Lead Story
Solar Cycle 25 reached its ceiling while most of us were looking down at our phones, and here is the consequence nobody printed on a poster: more human beings have stood in their own yards and watched the aurora in the last twenty-four months than in any comparable stretch in over half a century. NOAA's Space Weather Prediction Center places the cycle squarely inside its 2024 to 2026 maximum, the most productive run of solar activity in more than a decade.What makes this different from every previous maximum is not the sun. It is the camera in your pocket. Modern phone sensors gather wavelengths at low light that the human retina genuinely struggles with, which is why tens of thousands of people during last year's strongest storms photographed pink and emerald skies they could barely perceive with their own eyes. No ticket. No telescope. No club membership. A back door, a coat, and twenty minutes of patience.The operational face of that same maximum ran across NOAA's wire on Saturday: alert ALTEF3, serial number 3742, electron 2MeV integral flux above 1,000 pfu, a continued alert stretching into its third day. That is the quiet part of solar max, the part that ages satellite electronics and nudges GPS precision. The Kp5 threshold alert on September 8 was the same sun in its other mood.Elsewhere in this briefing: an Ebola outbreak in eastern Congo past 3,600 confirmed cases, two volcanoes at orange on American soil, and a flash flood warning that expired over Kanawha County while most of the country slept.
World Coverage
North Kivu and Ituri, Democratic Republic of the Congo · health
WHO's September 10 Disease Outbreak News confirms additional cases and deaths in the DRC, extending an outbreak that had already logged more than 3,626 confirmed infections by August. Uganda sits inside the response radius and has held its own case count flat. The pattern to respect here is duration: this outbreak has survived four months of containment effort.
Aleutian Islands, Alaska and Hawai'i Island, Hawai'i · volcanic
Alaska Volcano Observatory and Hawaiian Volcano Observatory both issued ORANGE aviation notices Saturday, with Shishaldin at YELLOW alongside. Great Sitkin sits directly beneath the great circle routes linking North America and Asia, where ash is an aircraft engine problem before it is ever a ground problem. Kilauea's activity keeps Puna district residents watching vents they know by name.
Clay and Kanawha Counties, West Virginia · flood
NWS Charleston issued a Flood Warning at 12:51 AM Sunday for east central Kanawha and west central Clay counties, driven by prior excessive rainfall rather than new storms. That distinction matters: saturated Appalachian hollows fail hours after the rain stops. MODIS true color and NDWI flood extent layers captured the basin at 38.40 north, 81.25 west on September 11.
Yudomari and the Bonin Islands, Japan · earthquake
A M5.1 struck 101 km south of Yudomari on Saturday, followed by a M4.9 in the Bonin Islands region on Sunday. No tsunami threat from either, and USGS rates both at the low end of consequence. Still, two moderate events on the same offshore arc inside 24 hours is worth logging, because Japan's instrumentation is dense enough that patterns show up early here.
Comanche and Stephens Counties, Oklahoma and San Saba County, Texas · wildfire
NASA EONET holds the MEERS, PINTO, and Kurk fires under active satellite watch, with the Moonshine fire in Albany County, Wyoming alongside. Sentinel and MODIS shortwave infrared bands show the burn scar geometry at 34.84 north, 98.68 west. September grass fires in Oklahoma move with the wind, and the wind this week is not cooperating anywhere on the plains.
Surviva Spotlight
Powered by Real-Time Intelligence
If you had Surviva's space weather thread active on September 8, you would have received the Kp5 threshold notification at issuance, 1751 UTC, not the next morning when the photos hit social feeds. That alert carries two payloads in one push: aurora visibility latitude for your specific coordinates, and the GPS and HF degradation window for the same period. One notification, two completely different reasons to care.For readers in Kanawha County, the 12:51 AM flood warning would have fired a location-matched alert while it was still dark, with the MODIS flood extent overlay from September 11 already loaded for context. Your household SOS network gets automatic check-in prompts within 30 seconds of any life-safety trigger in your radius. This is what it means to be prepared before the headline breaks.
The One Thing
Today's Essential Takeaway
If you take nothing else from today's briefing: the most democratic scientific instrument on the planet right now is a phone camera pointed north, and roughly two billion people already own one. During the strongest storms of this cycle, ordinary people in Lincolnshire, in Tennessee, in Patagonia produced tens of thousands of timestamped auroral observations that professional networks simply do not have the geographic density to match. Nobody asked them to. They just went outside because something remarkable was happening and they wanted to see it.I think about that a lot on Sundays. We spend most of this publication cataloguing the ways the world can go sideways, and that work matters. But the same curiosity that makes a person step onto a cold porch at midnight to look for green light is the curiosity that makes them read a flood forecast carefully, or ask which way their evacuation route runs. Wonder and readiness come from the same place. Go outside this week. Look up. It is free, and it will not last forever.
— Ato Phoenix
Mission Briefing
Bookmark swpc.noaa.gov/products/planetary-k-index and check it once tonight; a Kp of 5 or higher means step outside and look north, and it also means your GPS may drift. (swpc.noaa.gov)
Put your phone in night mode, prop it on something solid, and take a 10-second exposure of the northern horizon even if you see nothing; the sensor catches red oxygen emission your eyes cannot.
Kanawha and Clay County, West Virginia readers: do not drive any road where water covers the centerline, even after the warning expires; post-rainfall crests lag the storm by hours. (weather.gov/rlx)
Madison River Valley and Highway 287 corridor drivers: delay high-profile vehicle travel until after 6 PM Sunday when the High Wind Warning lifts; 60 mph gusts flip trailers. (weather.gov/tfx)
Judith Basin County residents: pre-stage anything loose in your yard tonight ahead of Monday morning's wind watch window.
Download offline maps for your county today; satellite and cellular navigation are the first things to wobble during elevated flux periods.
If you take medication, count your remaining days right now and refill anything under a 14-day supply. (ASHP drug shortage database)
Patch ConnectWise ScreenConnect, GitLab CE/EE, and JFrog Artifactory instances immediately; CISA added all three to the Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog on September 11. (cisa.gov/kev)
Travelers to or from Uganda and the DRC: review WHO's September 10 Disease Outbreak News before booking and know the symptom timeline for Bundibugyo virus. (who.int/emergencies)
Text one person in your life who lives alone and ask them what their plan is if the power goes out for three days; that conversation is the highest-return preparedness action available to you today.
Preparedness Guidance
Start with the sky, because it is the thing most people can act on today. If you live above roughly 45 degrees north, which includes Minneapolis, Seattle, Toronto, Manchester, and most of Scandinavia, you should be checking the planetary K-index the way you check a weather app. A Kp of 5 means go outside. A Kp of 7 means wake the kids. The exact same alert also tells you to expect GPS drift and HF radio absorption, so if you run a boat, fly a small aircraft, or volunteer with a search team, treat that number as a two-sided coin.
Now the water. Central West Virginia is flooding from rain that stopped hours ago, and that is the version of flooding that catches people. If you are on a private well in Clay or Kanawha County, assume your water is compromised until it is tested; a rolling boil for one full minute kills the bacterial and viral load, though it does nothing for chemical contamination from flooded fuel tanks or agricultural runoff. Watch for gastrointestinal symptoms in your household over the next week. In flood zones, the disease curve always lags the water curve.
Here is the Sunday thought underneath both of those. Every threat in today's data has a knowable signal that precedes it: a Kp number, a rainfall total, an aviation color code, a WHO situation report. None of them are hidden. They are published, free, and updated continuously. The gap between the prepared and the unprepared in 2026 is almost never access to information. It is the habit of looking. Build the habit on a quiet Sunday, and the loud Tuesday takes care of itself.
The Phoenix Signal
Pattern recognition from the editorial desk
Eighty events crossed my desk this weekend and the one I keep returning to is not a threat at all. It is the fact that a star 93 million miles away is currently at its loudest in over a decade, and the main consequence for most people is beauty. I have spent years explaining what the sun can take from us: grids, satellites, timing signals, radio. This cycle taught me to also count what it gives, and to notice who gets to receive it. The aurora does not check your income, your ZIP code, or your credentials. It just shows up over your house and waits to see if you are looking.
— Ato Phoenix
Coming Next
Global, above 45° latitude · next 24h
Watch for:A new ALTK05 or WARK05 alert from NOAA SWPC, indicating the planetary K-index has reached or is expected to reach 5. Electron flux has stayed above 1,000 pfu for three days, which means the source region is still active.
Escalation signal:Kp reaching 7 or higher, which drops the visible aurora boundary toward the 45th parallel and simultaneously degrades GPS timing
Aleutian Islands, Alaska · 24-48h
Watch for:Any Alaska Volcano Observatory notice moving Great Sitkin from ORANGE to RED. The volcano sits directly beneath high-density trans-Pacific great circle routes where ash is an engine hazard.
Escalation signal:A RED aviation code triggering immediate North Pacific route diversions
Judith Basin County, Montana · 24-48h
Watch for:The High Wind Watch opening Monday morning with west winds of 30 to 40 mph and gusts to 60. Combine that with cured September grass and any ignition source becomes a runaway.
Escalation signal:A Red Flag Warning issued alongside the wind watch
Western Uganda and North Kivu, DRC · 3-7 days
Watch for:Any confirmed Bundibugyo virus case reported outside DRC in WHO's next Disease Outbreak News. Uganda has held its count flat, and one full incubation cycle runs 21 days.
Escalation signal:A single confirmed Ugandan case, which resets the entire cross-border response geometry
Clay and Kanawha Counties, West Virginia · next 24h
Watch for:USGS stream gauge readings on the Elk and Kanawha systems. Flooding driven by prior rainfall peaks after the storm clears, and hollow roads fail on the recession side as often as the rising side.
Escalation signal:Any new rainfall over an already saturated basin, which compresses the next crest window dramatically
Three things carry into the week. The Judith Basin High Wind Watch converts Monday morning, and 40 mph sustained winds over cured Montana grass is an ignition environment, not just a driving inconvenience. Great Sitkin's aviation color code is the one to watch in the Aleutians; an escalation from ORANGE to RED diverts trans-Pacific traffic within hours. And Uganda's border district case counts over the next 21 days, one full incubation cycle, will tell us whether the Bundibugyo outbreak stays a one-country problem.
What I will be watching overnight is the K-index. The sun has been productive all week and the flux has not come down. If we get another Kp5 or better before Wednesday, a lot of people who have never seen the aurora are about to. Eyes on the northern horizon. Stay satisfyingly prepared. — The Surviva-List Editorial Team
Editor's Note
From the Editorial Desk
Sunday mornings are for the long view, and the longest view available to any of us right now is directly overhead. NOAA's Space Weather Prediction Center still has Solar Cycle 25 parked inside its maximum window, and the ALTEF3 electron flux alert renewed for a third consecutive day on Saturday. That combination is why ordinary people keep seeing the sky catch fire.Watch the Kp index this week. Anything at 5 or above, and the visible aurora boundary drops far enough south that porches in Iowa, Kent, and Tasmania become observation posts. SWPC publishes it free, updated every three hours.The sun is running loud. Knowing what that means is the difference between wonder and worry.
— Ato Phoenix, Editor-in-Chief