PICK OF THE WEEK
Pick of The Week
Prominence Eruptions! (January 22, 2004)
Hi-res TIF image (3.1M)
Hi-res TIF image (2.3M)
MPEG EIT 195-Full Sun Large (1.2M), Small (407K) EIT 195 Large (705K), Small (230K) |
Quicktime
EIT-Full Sun Large (1.0M), Small (251K) EIT 195 Large (1.0M), Small (171K) |
In a matter of hours two large prominence eruptions occurred on the
Sun on January 21-22, 2003. The first and smaller filament was
located in the Sun's lower left quadrant and its eruption is
accompanied by a coronal mass ejection followed by a long cylinder of
post-coronal loops. Just hours later another long solar filament
(upper right quadrant) was observed erupting as it neared the Sun's
edge. The series of stills, taken by the EIT 195 instrument over a
six-hour period shows this prominence in profile before, during and
after its eruption. (Filaments are called prominences when they can
be seen in profile.) This particular prominence was over 50 times the
diameter of Earth, reaching almost half way across the Sun.
Prominences are cooler structures that "float" above the Sun's
surface, sometimes for several weeks. This one has been observed for
almost two weeks as it rotated around with the Sun. The video clips
show the full disk and a close-up of the second eruption over about a
one-day period.
Hi-res TIF image (1.9M)
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