Class Act
In August 2012, a long filament of solar material coalesced in the sun's atmosphere. For several days it was visible, appearing from Earth's viewpoint to curl up and over the left side of the sun. Scientists estimate its length was approximately 186,000 miles, equivalent to 30 Earths placed side by side. On August 31 at 4:36 p.m. EDT, the filament expanded and erupted, releasing particles into space at speeds of 900 miles per second. The ejected material did not head directly toward Earth, though some of it did glance off the planet's magnetic environment, or magnetosphere, causing aurora to appear on the night of Monday, September 3. The video shows the eruption—a particularly gorgeous one, even for veteran observers of the sun—as seen by three NASA spacecraft.
Material hovering in the sun's atmosphere explodes with style.
NASA's SDO and STEREO missions and the joint ESA/NASA SOHO mission each captured views of the eruption.
Scientists observe the eruption in multiple wavelengths to see solar material at different temperatures.
Material ejected from the sun dwarfs Earth (inserted above and shown to scale for comparison).
Beautiful aurorae, as seen in this photo taken near Whitehorse, Yukon Territory, filled the night sky on Sep. 3, 2012 as a result of the eruption.
For More Information
See NASA.gov
Credits
Please give credit for this item to:
NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center
Aurora photo courtesy of David Cartier, Sr.
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Animator
- Tom Bridgman (Global Science and Technology, Inc.)
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Producer
- Scott Wiessinger (USRA)
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Writer
- Karen Fox (ADNET Systems, Inc.)
Release date
This page was originally published on Thursday, September 13, 2012.
This page was last updated on Wednesday, May 3, 2023 at 1:52 PM EDT.
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