THIS EXPLOSION MIGHT HIT EARTH: Yesterday, Dec. 9th, a magnetic filament in the sun's southern hemisphere erupted, possibly hurling a fraction of itself into space: movie. SOHO coronagraph movies are inconclusive. A faint CME might have left the blast site. If so, it could jolt Earth's magnetic field on Dec. 12th. Aurora alerts: SMS Text.
THIS EXPLOSION DEFINITELY WON'T: The sun just shot an interestingly narrow stream of plasma into space. SOHO coronagraphs watched it jet away from the southwestern limb of the sun on Dec. 9th:
This was no ordinary CME. The jet was less than 50 thousand km wide at its base, but it stretched more than 15 million km into space. Coherent blob-like structures can be seen traveling down the stream as the eruption progresses.
The underlying physics of this event is a bit of a mystery. It might be a strangely skinny helmet streamer. Helmet streamers are magnetic arches rooted in the sun, which are sculpted and stretched by the solar wind. They're normally 10 to 100 times wider than this one, though.
One thing is certain: It won't hit Earth. Maybe next time.
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ORION IS COMING IN HOT: NASA's Orion spacecraft is hurtling toward Earth for a nail-biting re-entry on Dec. 11th. "Last night I photographed Orion on its way back from the Moon for a Pacific Ocean splashdown this weekend," reports Rob Matson of Newport Coast, CA. He stitched together 42 images to create this video:
"Orion was at a range of ~262,000 km at about magnitude +15. Toward the middle of the image sequence it had a solar glint to about +13.5," says Matson. "It was an easy target for my 11-inch telescope."
Tomorrow Orion will skip across the top of the atmosphere like a pebble on the surface of a pond, bleeding away some of its kinetic energy before it plunges toward the Pacific Ocean like a 5,000 degree Fahrenheit meteor. Will Orion's experimental heat shield work? Tune into NASA TV on Dec. 11th for live coverage.
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GIFTS FROM THE EDGE OF SPACE: Christmas is coming. Are you looking for a far-out gift? Check out the Earth to Sky Store. It's filled with unique items that have flown to the edge of space onboard cosmic ray research balloons.
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