GIANT FILAMENT ERUPTS, PRODUCES CME: A giant filament of solar magnetism, which amateur astronomers have been monitoring for more than a week, erupted yesterday. Click to view a movie of the event as recorded by NASAs Solar Dynamics Observatory: Astronomers had been bracing for the possibility that the filament would collapse, causing a Hyder flare when it landed on the solar surface. Instead, it erupted and hurled part of itself into space. The Solar and Heliospheric Observatory recorded a CME emerging from the blast site: CME movie. The CME billowed away from the sun at 520 km/s (1.2 million mph). Although that sounds fast, it is actually slower than the average CME. This makes sense because the explosion itself was very slow. This tiime-lapse movie is nearly 24 hours long. Coronagraph images show that the explosion was not squarely Earth-directed. Most of the CME will sail south of the sun-Earth line. Nevertheless, there could be a glancing blow on or about June 7th, possibly sparking polar geomagnetic storms.
Posted on: Fri, 06 Jun 2014 02:12:05 +0000