Committee Chair and Sunspot Observing Group Leader: Carl E. Feehrer
Solar Flare/SID Observing Group Leader: Mike Hill

Observer Reporting
The progressive diminution in the sun's activity as solar minimum approaches has resulted in a reduced amount of reporting by the corps of sunspot and SID observers. During the period covered by this summary, a total of 333 sunspot reports containing 4611 observations were received, while a total of 102 SID reports were received. The sunspot and SID reports were contributed by 82 and 20 observers, respectively. As always, the contributions were made by an active, widely distributed group of observers from the United States, Canada, Europe, South America, South Africa, India and Australia.

Observer Awards
Three new observers have now met the criteria established for awarding of certificates that recognize significant contributions. SID observer Paul Campbell from Canada and sunspot observers Gerd-Lutz Schott from Germany and James Knight from South Africa have now joined the earlier group of 26 that have achieved this distinction. In accord with tradition, these new observers will be recognized and receive their certificates at the AAVSO's Fall meeting.

Website Activity
Contributions of photos continue to be received and posted to the AAVSO website, though at a much reduced level. Presumably this outcome, like the reduction in reports, is due to the relatively small amount of solar activity.

Reorganization of Solar Committee
Carl Feehrer, chair of the Solar Committee and Sunspot Group Leader since 2000 will step down from his responsibilities in May. Taking his place as chair of the Committee will be Paul Mortfield, a SID observer who lives in Canada. Paul participates in the SOHO program and is active in solar outreach efforts. Daniel Williams, a new volunteer interested in H-alpha and white-light sunspot observing lives in Nebraska and will take over as Sunspot Group Leader. Mike Hill, SID/Solar Flare Group Leader and SID analyst will continue in his present position.

The current chair wishes to thank observers and AAVSO staff all of those for their unstinting support during his tenure and expresses the hope that they will welcome the new team and help to make their service as interesting and enjoyable as they made his.

Acknowledgements
As always, the successful performance of the Solar Committee's work during the reporting period was due to the dedication and activities of our solar observers, AAVSO staff, and headquarters' volunteer Arthur Ritchie. We are grateful to this group for their extensive support.

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NOTE: As of May 15, I will no longer be able to guarantee that reports received by postal mail at my local address will be able to be forwarded to AAVSO headquarters in time for processing. Therefore, please be sure to send all regular mail reports and other communiques to the AAVSO headquarters address shown at the bottom of page 1.

Thank you.

-CEF

Michael Hill, SID Analyst 114 Prospect St Marlborough, MA 01752 USA noatak@aol.com

Observer Code Station(s) monitored A Clerkin A29 NAA J Winkler A50 NAA NML P King A80 HWU M Hill A87 NAA J Mandaville A90 NPM G Di Filippo A93 HWU R Battaiola A96 HWU J Wallace A97 NAA M King A99 HWU F Steyn A102 NAA NWC L Observatory A107 DHO P Mortfield A108 NAA M Suhovecky A115 NAA K Hubal A117 NAA

The events listed above meet at least one of the following criteria Event reported by two or more observers within +/- 5 minutes Event matched to GOES-8 XRA event to within +/- 15 minutes and event time < 1000 UT Reported by observer with a high quality rating > 8 (scale 1-10)

Solar Events

April was a slow month but activity did pick up a bit from what we have had in the past few months. There were 19 correlated SID events reported by observers, most of them of low to medium importance rating. There were 132 X-Ray flares recorded by the GOES-12 satellite and of these only four were M-Class, 24 were C-Class and the rest were B-Class. Thanks to all of you for reporting in. I didn't get as many NO SID reports which was nice to see.