View allAll Photos Tagged SDO
The Fall 2011 eclipse season started on September 11, 2011. Here is an AIA 304 image from 0658 UT. SDO has eclipse seasons twice a year near each equinox. For three weeks near midnight Las Cruces time (about 0700 UT) our orbit has the Earth pass between SDO and the Sun. These eclipses can last up to 72 minutes in the middle of an eclipse season. The current eclipse season started on September 11 and lasts until October 4.
To read more about SDO go to: sdo.gsfc.nasa.gov/
Credit: NASA/GSFC/SDO
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center enables NASA’s mission through four scientific endeavors: Earth Science, Heliophysics, Solar System Exploration, and Astrophysics. Goddard plays a leading role in NASA’s accomplishments by contributing compelling scientific knowledge to advance the Agency’s mission.
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NASA SDO image 7.26.14 -- lunar transit and a minor solar flare.
Happy Birthday, Steve!
Thank you NASA/SDO, and the AIA, EVE, and HMI science teams, for the wonderful data/resources.
NASA image captured January 28, 2011
This still from NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) caught the action in freeze-frame splendor when the Sun popped off two events at once on Jan. 28, 2011. A filament on the left side became unstable and erupted, while an M-1 flare (mid-sized) and a Coronal Mass Ejection on the right blasted into space. The movie, taken Jan. 26-28, 2011, shows several other flashes and bursts from the active region on the right as well. Neither event is headed towards Earth.
Credit: NASA/GSFC/SDO
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center enables NASA’s mission through four scientific endeavors: Earth Science, Heliophysics, Solar System Exploration, and Astrophysics. Goddard plays a leading role in NASA’s accomplishments by contributing compelling scientific knowledge to advance the Agency’s mission.
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Caption: The first of two coronal mass ejections (CMEs) on Jan. 23, 2013, can be seen erupting in the lower left portion of this image, from the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory. This CME was not Earth-directed. This image is what's known as a coronagraph, in which the bright light of the sun itself is blocked in order to better see the sun's atmosphere, the corona.
Credit: ESA, NASA/SOHO
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On Jan. 23, 2013, at 9:55 a.m. EST, the sun erupted with an Earth-directed coronal mass ejection, or CME. Experimental NASA research models, based on observations from the Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory (STEREO) and ESA/NASA’s Solar and Heliospheric Observatory, show that the CME left the sun at speeds of around 375 miles per second, which is a fairly typical speed for CMEs.
Not to be confused with a solar flare, a CME is a solar phenomenon that can send solar particles into space and reach Earth one to three days later.
Earth-directed CMEs can cause a space weather phenomenon called a geomagnetic storm, which occurs when they connect with the outside of the Earth's magnetic envelope, the magnetosphere, for an extended period of time. In the past, CMEs of this speed have not caused substantial geomagnetic storms. They sometimes cause auroras near the poles but are unlikely to affect electrical systems on Earth or interfere with GPS or satellite-based communications systems.
A slightly slower CME that was not Earth-directed, also erupted earlier in the day.
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center enables NASA’s mission through four scientific endeavors: Earth Science, Heliophysics, Solar System Exploration, and Astrophysics. Goddard plays a leading role in NASA’s accomplishments by contributing compelling scientific knowledge to advance the Agency’s mission.
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Caption: This is a video of magnetic loops on the sun, captured by NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory. It has been processed to highlight the edges of each loop to make the structure more clear. A series of loops such as this is known as a flux rope, and these lie at the heart of eruptions on the sun known as coronal mass ejections (CMEs.) This is the first time scientists were able to discern the timing of a flux rope's formation. (Blended 131 and 171 angstrom light view of flux rope formation and eruption.)
Credit: NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center/SDO
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On July 18, 2012, a fairly small explosion of light burst off the lower right limb of the sun. Such flares often come with an associated eruption of solar material, known as a coronal mass ejection or CME – but this one did not. Something interesting did happen, however. Magnetic field lines in this area of the sun's atmosphere, the corona, began to twist and kink, generating the hottest solar material – a charged gas called plasma – to trace out the newly-formed slinky shape. The plasma glowed brightly in extreme ultraviolet images from the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly (AIA) aboard NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) and scientists were able to watch for the first time the very formation of something they had long theorized was at the heart of many eruptive events on the sun: a flux rope.
Eight hours later, on July 19, the same region flared again. This time the flux rope's connection to the sun was severed, and the magnetic fields escaped into space, dragging billions of tons of solar material along for the ride -- a classic CME.
"Seeing this structure was amazing," says Angelos Vourlidas, a solar scientist at the Naval Research Laboratory in Washington, D.C. "It looks exactly like the cartoon sketches theorists have been drawing of flux ropes since the 1970s. It was a series of figure eights lined up to look like a giant slinky on the sun." To read more about this new discovery go to: 1.usa.gov/14UHsTt
NASA image captured March 2-4, 2011.
NASA's SDO satellite captured the moon passing infront of the sun.
View a hd video of this event here: www.flickr.com/photos/gsfc/5497274056
Credit: NASA/GSFC/SDO
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center enables NASA’s mission through four scientific endeavors: Earth Science, Heliophysics, Solar System Exploration, and Astrophysics. Goddard plays a leading role in NASA’s accomplishments by contributing compelling scientific knowledge to advance the Agency’s mission.
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>>> SHOT YESTERDAY WITH SUNSPOTS VISIBLE. THERE HAVE BEEN SEVERAL C AND M-CLASS FLARES, ONE WHILE I WAS SHOOTING (BUT THIS IS NOT THE GEAR FOR THAT JOB -- FOR THAT, YOU NEED SPACE-BASED IMAGERS SUCH AS THOSE ABOARD SDO, BUT MY JUNK IS A CLOSE SECOND TO MOST OF THOSE ;-}. I USE AN OLD FUJI THAT'S ALREADY PARTIALLY BROKEN, BUT WORKS OK FOR LIMITED LUNAR/SOLAR PHOTOGRAPHY (EVEN GREAT, ON OCCASION, TO MY SURPRISE). PROST.
The changes of a coronal cell region as solar rotation carries it across the solar disk as seen with NASA's STEREO-B spacecraft. The camera is fixed on the region (panning with it) and shows the plumes changing to cells and back to plumes again -- based on the observatory's perspective -- during the interval June 7-14, 2011.
To read more about this event go to: www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/sunearth/news/solar-plumes.html
Credit: NASA/GSFC/STEREO
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center enables NASA’s mission through four scientific endeavors: Earth Science, Heliophysics, Solar System Exploration, and Astrophysics. Goddard plays a leading role in NASA’s accomplishments by contributing compelling scientific knowledge to advance the Agency’s mission.
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Early this morning (at 7:30am UT / 2:30am EDT) May 3, 2011, the Moon once again passed in front of SDO's view of the Sun, allowing mission scientists to calibrate their cameras by focusing on the fine details of the mountains silhouetted along the Moon's limb.
The image here is a crop from the high-resolution AIA 171 image, showing the Sun's corona behind the Moon's southwestern limb. Viewing it full-size will show the ragged, mountainous line of the lunar landscape. (Image slightly adjusted to enhance detail.)
Watch a video of the event on Universe Today: www.universetoday.com/85356/sdo-the-moon-gets-in-my-way/
Image courtesy of NASA/SDO and the AIA, EVE, and HMI science teams. Edited by J. Major.
Rotated view (east is up) of the huge solar ejection during the early morning hours of June 7, 2011 as seen by SDO's AIA 304 assembly. The scale size of Earth is at upper left.
Courtesy of NASA/SDO and the AIA, EVE, and HMI science teams. Edited by J. Major.
Watch a video of this at www.youtube.com/watch?v=_UnPYE7dvzg
Read more at lightsinthedark.wordpress.com/2011/06/07/solar/
NASA image captured December 6, 2010
A huge magnetic filament snaking around the sun's SE limb, stretching more than 700,000 km, has erupted. NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory recorded the break. Zoom version.
Credit: NASA/SDO
To download this file go to: www.nasa.gov/multimedia/videogallery/index.html?media_id=...
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center enables NASA’s mission through four scientific endeavors: Earth Science, Heliophysics, Solar System Exploration, and Astrophysics. Goddard plays a leading role in NASA’s accomplishments by contributing compelling scientific knowledge to advance the Agency’s mission.
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Eruptive events on the sun can be wildly different. Some come just with a solar flare, some with an additional ejection of solar material called a coronal mass ejection (CME), and some with complex moving structures in association with changes in magnetic field lines that loop up into the sun's atmosphere, the corona.
To view the full length video go to: youtu.be/HFT7ATLQQx8 or
to download the file go here: svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/goto?11168
On July 19, 2012, an eruption occurred on the sun that produced all three. A moderately powerful solar flare exploded on the sun's lower right hand limb, sending out light and radiation. Next came a CME, which shot off to the right out into space. And then, the sun treated viewers to one of its dazzling magnetic displays – a phenomenon known as coronal rain.
Over the course of the next day, hot plasma in the corona cooled and condensed along strong magnetic fields in the region. Magnetic fields, themselves, are invisible, but the charged plasma is forced to move along the lines, showing up brightly in the extreme ultraviolet wavelength of 304 Angstroms, which highlights material at a temperature of about 50,000 Kelvin. This plasma acts as a tracer, helping scientists watch the dance of magnetic fields on the sun, outlining the fields as it slowly falls back to the solar surface.
The footage in this video was collected by the Solar Dynamics Observatory's AIA instrument. SDO collected one frame every 12 seconds, and the movie plays at 30 frames per second, so each second in this video corresponds to 6 minutes of real time. The video covers 12:30 a.m. EDT to 10:00 p.m. EDT on July 19, 2012.
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Comet Lovejoy skimmed across the Sun's edge about 140,000 km above the surface late Dec. 15 and early Dec. 16, 2011, furiously brightening and vaporizing as it approached the Sun. It is the brightest sungrazing comet that SOHO has ever seen, with a nucleus about twice as wide as a football field. It unexpectedly survived the pass and cruised out from behind the Sun some hours later. Comets are ancient balls of dust and ice. There is a temporary, four hour gap in the SOHO data after the comet went behind the occulting disk. We will remake these movies when that data comes in.
Credit: NASA/SDO
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center enables NASA’s mission through four scientific endeavors: Earth Science, Heliophysics, Solar System Exploration, and Astrophysics. Goddard plays a leading role in NASA’s accomplishments by contributing compelling scientific knowledge to advance the Agency’s mission.
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The Moon passed between SDO and the Sun from 1331-1556 UTC (8:31-1056 am ET). At 2.5 hours in length, it was the longest lunar transit so far in the SDO mission. This still was taken at 14:58 UT, just about when the Moon was centered against the Sun. The image combines individual frames from two wavelengths of extreme ultraviolet light (the 304 Angstrom and the 171 Angstrom channels) taken at the same time.
NASA image release July 16, 2010
This composite image shows the HMI magnetic field in blue and orange (indicating opposite polarity) aligned with the AIA 171 channel in extreme ultraviolet superimposed over it (May 23, 2010). The juxtaposition is especially effective at showing how the arcs that we observe in UV light emerge from regions of strong magnetic field.
SDO is designed to help us understand the Sun's influence on Earth and Near-Earth space by studying the solar atmosphere on small scales of space and time and in many wavelengths simultaneously.
To learn more about SDO go to: sdo.gsfc.nasa.gov/
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center is home to the nation's largest organization of combined scientists, engineers and technologists that build spacecraft, instruments and new technology to study the Earth, the sun, our solar system, and the universe.
Credit: NASA/GSFC/SDO
NASA SDO images -- "inertial offpoint" -- 7.19.14 1512 UT
[ Thank you NASA/SDO, and the AIA, EVE, and HMI science teams, for the wonderful data/resources. ]
Three active regions lined up vertically and each of the loop structures above them twisted differently when viewed in extreme ultraviolet light (Oct. 15 - 17, 2011). The high arching loops of the top active region seemed to lean to the north; the one beneath it clearly coiled to the south; at the bottom, one spread mostly upright and to the left and right as well. The loops are tracing particles spiraling along magnetic field lines that have emerged from underneath the Sun's surface. While the movie shows that the loops shifted and changed over 2.5 days, the basic structure of all three remained very much the same. It is not common to see active regions so neatly aligned atop one another.
Credit: NASA/GSFC/SDO
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center enables NASA’s mission through four scientific endeavors: Earth Science, Heliophysics, Solar System Exploration, and Astrophysics. Goddard plays a leading role in NASA’s accomplishments by contributing compelling scientific knowledge to advance the Agency’s mission.
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NASA image release January 6, 2010
Caption: Spicules on the sun, as observed by the Solar Dynamics Observatory. These bursts of gas jet off the surface of the sun at 150,000 miles per hour and contain gas that reaches temperatures over a million degrees.
GREENBELT, Md. -- Observations from NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) and the Japanese satellite Hinode show that some gas in the giant, fountain-like jets in the sun's atmosphere known as spicules can reach temperatures of millions of degrees. The finding offers a possible new framework for how the sun's high atmosphere gets so much hotter than the surface of the sun.
What makes the high atmosphere, or corona, so hot – over a million degrees, compared to the sun surface's 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit -- remains a poorly understood aspect of the sun's complicated space weather system. That weather system can reach Earth, causing auroral lights and, if strong enough, disrupting Earth's communications and power systems. Understanding such phenomena, therefore, is an important step towards better protecting our satellites and power grids.
"The traditional view is that all the heating happens higher up in the corona," says Dean Pesnell, who is SDO's project scientist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. "The suggestion in this paper is that cool gas is being ejected from the sun's surface in spicules and getting heated on its way to the corona."
Spicules were first named in the 1940s, but were hard to study in detail until recently, says Bart De Pontieu of Lockheed Martin's Solar and Astrophysics Laboratory, Palo Alto, Calif. who is the lead author on a paper on this subject in the January 7, 2011 issue of Science magazine.
In visible light, spicules can be seen to send large masses of so-called plasma – the electromagnetic gas that surrounds the sun – up through the lower solar atmosphere or photosphere. The amount of material sent up is stunning, some 100 times as much as streams away from the sun in the solar wind towards the edges of the solar system. But nobody knew if they contained hot gas.
"Heating of spicules to the necessary hot temperatures has never been observed, so their role in coronal heating had been dismissed as unlikely," says De Pontieu.
Now, De Pontieu's team -- which included researchers at Lockheed Martin, the High Altitude Observatory of the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) in Colorado and the University of Oslo, Norway -- was able to combine images from SDO and Hinode to produce a more complete picture of the gas inside these gigantic fountains.
The scientists found that a large fraction of the gas is heated to a hundred thousand degrees, while a small fraction is heated to millions of degrees. Time-lapsed images show that this material spews up into the corona, with most falling back down towards the surface of the sun. However, the small fraction of the gas that is heated to millions of degrees does not immediately return to the surface. Given the large number of spicules on the Sun, and the amount of material in the spicules, the scientists believe that if even some of that super hot plasma stays aloft it would make a contribution to coronal heating.
Astrophysicist Jonathan Cirtain, who is the U.S. project scientist for Hinode at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Ala., says that incorporating such new information helps address an important question that reaches far beyond the sun. "This breakthrough in our understanding of the mechanisms which transfer energy from the solar photosphere to the corona addresses one of the most compelling questions in stellar astrophysics: How is the atmosphere of a star heated?" he says. "This is a fantastic discovery, and demonstrates the muscle of the NASA Heliophysics System Observatory, comprised of numerous instruments on multiple observatories."
Hinode is the second mission in NASA's Solar Terrestrial Probes program, the goal of which is to improve understanding of fundamental solar and space physics processes. The mission is led by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) and the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (NAOJ). The collaborative mission includes the U.S., the United Kingdom, Norway and Europe. NASA Marshall manages Hinode U.S. science operations and oversaw development of the scientific instrumentation provided for the mission by NASA, academia and industry. The Lockheed Martin Advanced Technology Center is the lead U.S. investigator for the Solar Optical Telescope on Hinode.
SDO is the first mission in a NASA science program called Living With a Star, the goal of which is to develop the scientific understanding necessary to address those aspects of the sun-Earth system that directly affect our lives and society. NASA Goddard built, operates, and manages the SDO spacecraft for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington.
To learn more go to: www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/sdo/news/news20110106-spicules...
Credit: NASA Goddard/SDO/AIA
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center enables NASA’s mission through four scientific endeavors: Earth Science, Heliophysics, Solar System Exploration, and Astrophysics. Goddard plays a leading role in NASA’s accomplishments by contributing compelling scientific knowledge to advance the Agency’s mission.
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Full disk view of a filament launch in the SDO AIA 304 band.
Credit: NASA/GSFC/SVS/SDO
To read more about this animation go to: www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/sdo/news/first-light.html
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center is home to the nation's largest organization of combined scientists, engineers and technologists that build spacecraft, instruments and new technology to study the Earth, the sun, our solar system, and the universe.
Courtesy of NASA/SDO and the AIA, EVE, and HMI science teams. Screenshot aus www.youtube.com/watch?v=AhWMOkrzKzs
(print scan) Taken from area 100 at Glasgow International, Malinair's first Dornier 228-200 PH-SDO was leased from Schreiner, later being acquired as G-MLDO.
NASA APOD Astronomy Picture of the Day for 2013 August 20!
It was cloudy in Missoula for the transit of Venus, so I watched it on the web. Here is a false-color RGB composite of the Sun and Venus on June 5 2012 at 23:58 UTC. Loops and prominences of hot gas are erupting into the Sun's corona, or upper atmosphere. Since the Sun's coronal gases are hotter than the 5800K (5500ºC) surface, they glow at ultraviolet "colors" instead of the surface's familiar white light. These particular wavelengths are UV light emitted by multiply ionized iron, at temperatures from 600,000K to 2,000,000K. Coloring three different B&W images red, green and blue as if they represented visible light makes a sensible color image out of normally invisible light.
Highest resolution image is available here.
Original extreme UV images at 171Å (B), 193Å (G) and 211Å (R) are from the SDO (Solar Dynamics Observatory) satellite's AIA (Atmospheric Imaging Assembly) camera.
Source images courtesy of NASA/SDO and the AIA, EVE, and HMI science teams.
The Sun on 2014.01.11 in extreme ultraviolet light, with wavelengths around 200Å. This is a color composite of three B&W source images from NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory AIA camera.
SDO watched as areas of a sunspot group changed substantially over 2.5 days (Aug. 21-23, 2011). While one sunspot shrunk to just a dot or two, another one nearby came out of nowhere, twisted, elongated and grew so that it dwarfed the other spots. Sunspots have been known to change fairly quickly, so this is not a new phenomenon. Still, it is interesting to watch them transform themselves. Sunspots are darker cooler areas of intense magnetism that rise up from below the Sun's surface. The images and movie were produced using visible light pictures from the HMI (Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager) instrument.
Credit: NASA/GSFC/SDO
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center enables NASA’s mission through four scientific endeavors: Earth Science, Heliophysics, Solar System Exploration, and Astrophysics. Goddard plays a leading role in NASA’s accomplishments by contributing compelling scientific knowledge to advance the Agency’s mission.
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[ SDO image -- AIA 94, 193. & 335 ]
>>> X-flare 3.1 (source: sun spot AR2192)
DATA FROM NOAA:
Space Weather Message Code: SUMX01
Serial Number: 106
Issue Time: 2014 Oct 24 2236 UTC
SUMMARY: X-ray Event exceeded X1
Begin Time: 2014 Oct 24 2107 UTC
Maximum Time: 2014 Oct 24 2141 UTC
End Time: 2014 Oct 24 2213 UTC
X-ray Class: X3.1
Optical Class: 3b
Location: S12W22
NOAA Scale: R3 – Strong
"A pulse of extreme UV radiation from the flare ionized the upper layers of Earth's atmosphere, causing a brief but strong blackout of HF radio communications over the dayside of Earth. Such blackouts may be noticed by amateur radio operators, aviators, and mariners."
"Coronagraph data from the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) suggest that the explosion did not hurl a significant CME toward our planet. (Interestinngly, none of the X-flares from this active region has so far produced a major CME.) As a result, Earth-effects may be limited to the radio blackout. ~ spaceweather[dot]com
[Thank you, NASA/SDO, and the AIA, EVE, and HMI science teams, for the wonderful data/resources.]
This image shows an approximative comparison between the Earth and the Sun. The Sun is about 109 times the size of the Earth.
This rough comparison shows the size of an eruption on June 18, 2023.
In this image, the northern hemisphere is up and the southern hemisphere down.
This image is in false colors. Combination with AIA335, AIA304 and AIA171
Observed by SDO on June 18, 2023 at a wavelength of 304 A, 335 A and 171 A.
The wavelength is ultraviolet for the sun. Earth is in visible light.
Sun credit : NASA/SDO and the AIA, EVE, and HMI science teams.
Earth credit : JAXA/ISAS/PSI - Processing : Thomas Thomopoulos
Edition, choice of filter combination, composition with Earth and post process : Thomas Thomopoulos
Visualisation and process of SDO image with Jhelioviewer
A huge solar flare erupted near the Sun's northeastern limb on March 7, 2011, at about 2:21 PM EST, sending solar plasma over 200,000 miles into space and a wave of solar particles outward from the Sun at the fastest speeds seen in over 5 years.
The small circle at upper right is the comparative size of Earth.
See more images from NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory at: sdo.gsfc.nasa.gov/ and watch this region in action at www.youtube.com/watch?v=SeSKSmEVwz8
Courtesy of NASA/SDO and the AIA, EVE, and HMI science teams.
SDO observed a beautiful prominence eruption shot off the east limb (left side) of the Sun (April 16, 2012). Such eruptions are often associated with solar flares, and in this case an M1.7 class (medium-sized) flare did occur at the same time, though it was not aimed toward Earth. The movie (in extreme ultraviolet light) covers four hours of activity. As we have observed in some other events, some of the charged particles do not have enough force behind them to break away and they can be seen streaming back into the Sun.
NASA image captured March 2-4, 2011.
NASA's SDO satellite captured the moon passing infront of the sun.
View a high res still of this event here: www.flickr.com/photos/gsfc/5496697069/
Credit: NASA/GSFC/SDO
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center enables NASA’s mission through four scientific endeavors: Earth Science, Heliophysics, Solar System Exploration, and Astrophysics. Goddard plays a leading role in NASA’s accomplishments by contributing compelling scientific knowledge to advance the Agency’s mission.
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YX14 SDO is a Volvo B9R with Plaxton Panther 3 C53Ft coachwork which was new to the Andrew's of Tideswell fleet in June 2014.
It is seen here in July 2021 dropping off in Bakewell.
KR16 SDO
2016 Volvo FMX420
P.J. Murphy Tipper Haulage, Waddesdon, Buckinghamshire
A413 near Buckingham, 14 May 2021
The second of two coronal mass ejections (CMEs) on Jan. 23, 2013, is seen erupting in the top of the picture, away from the sun, which is obscured by the disk in the center. The Solar and Heliospheric Observatory captured this image, called a coronagraph: the bright light of the sun itself is blocked to provide a better view of the sun's atmosphere, the corona. This CME left the sun at speeds of 375 miles per second (1.35 million mph), which is almost 10 times lower than the very fastest CMEs.
Credit: ESA, NASA/SOHO
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On Jan. 23, 2013, at 9:55 a.m. EST, the sun erupted with an Earth-directed coronal mass ejection, or CME. Experimental NASA research models, based on observations from the Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory (STEREO) and ESA/NASA’s Solar and Heliospheric Observatory, show that the CME left the sun at speeds of around 375 miles per second, which is a fairly typical speed for CMEs.
Not to be confused with a solar flare, a CME is a solar phenomenon that can send solar particles into space and reach Earth one to three days later.
Earth-directed CMEs can cause a space weather phenomenon called a geomagnetic storm, which occurs when they connect with the outside of the Earth's magnetic envelope, the magnetosphere, for an extended period of time. In the past, CMEs of this speed have not caused substantial geomagnetic storms. They sometimes cause auroras near the poles but are unlikely to affect electrical systems on Earth or interfere with GPS or satellite-based communications systems.
A slightly slower CME that was not Earth-directed, also erupted earlier in the day.
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center enables NASA’s mission through four scientific endeavors: Earth Science, Heliophysics, Solar System Exploration, and Astrophysics. Goddard plays a leading role in NASA’s accomplishments by contributing compelling scientific knowledge to advance the Agency’s mission.
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NASA image acquired May 2010
An AIA image in 193 Å after a solar eruption and a flare. The dark regions show the site of evacuated material from the eruption, and the large magnetic loops were formed during the flare.
To learn more about SDO go to: sdo.gsfc.nasa.gov/
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center is home to the nation's largest organization of combined scientists, engineers and technologists that build spacecraft, instruments and new technology to study the Earth, the sun, our solar system, and the universe.
A magnetically active region along the Sun's northwestern region on February 11, 2011. SDO AIA 171 image, rotated 90º, cropped and adjusted to bring out detail.
Small circle at upper right is the size of Earth, to scale.
Image credit: SDO (NASA) and the AIA consortium.
(Edited by J. Major.)
This SDO image (AIA 193) shows an M9-class solar flare erupting on the Sun's northeastern hemisphere at 03:49 UT on Jan. 23, 2012... just 4 days after a previous strong CME that sparked aurora around the world on the 22nd. More geomagnetic activity is expected for the 24th.
NASA/SDO and the AIA consortium. Edited by J. Major.
More at sdo.gsfc.nasa.gov/
From an SDO image chosen as the Pick of the Week for October 15th, this shot is almost too cool to be real...but it is! As the New Moon passed between the Solar Dynamics Observatory and the Sun, the spacecraft in geosynchronous orbit got a view of the Moon's silhouetted disc passing across its normally unobstructed solar view. At the same time an energetic flare was erupting along the Sun's limb. Amazing!
The image shown here has been rotated 180º to put the southern hemisphere of the Moon facing upwards. The large-size version will show the rugged terrain of the Moon's south pole. It has also been color-edited, sharpened via high pass and level-adjusted to bring out details in the Sun's surface.
See the original Pick of the Week post and video of the event on SDO's main site here: sdo.gsfc.nasa.gov/gallery/potw.php?v=item&id=27
Image credit: NASA (SDO) and the AIA Consortium. Edited by J. Major.
SDO captured a splendid example of expanding coronal loops seen in profile at the edge of the Sun (Oct. 14-15, 2014). The bright loops began to form and grow after a long-lasting M-class flare erupted. The arcs of the loops we see in extreme ultraviolet light are actually particles spiraling along magnetic field lines arcing above the active region that was the source of the flare. They are reorganizing the magnetic field after its disruption. To give a sense of scale, these huge loops are reaching out more than 15 times the size of Earth. Credit: Solar Dynamics Observatory/NASA.
A good-sized solar flare erupted from sunspot 1302 on September 25, at 15:59 UT, as seen here in an image from SDO (cropped and edited.) sdo.gsfc.nasa.gov/
The scale size of Earth is shown by the blue globe at lower left.
Also seen here is a circular clump of plasma that has broken off a prominence (upper left.)
Taken with the AIA 304 imaging assembly.
Courtesy of NASA / SDO and the AIA imaging team. Edited by J. Major.
Sunderland District offices on 23 February 1975, nearly two years after being obsorbed by parent company, Northern General. Does the block still stand?
Scanned from a Kodachrome slide taken by the late Charles Dean, now in my collection.
NASA image captured January 28, 2011
This still from NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) caught the action in freeze-frame splendor when the Sun popped off two events at once on Jan. 28, 2011. A filament on the left side became unstable and erupted, while an M-1 flare (mid-sized) and a Coronal Mass Ejection on the right blasted into space. The movie, taken Jan. 26-28, 2011, shows several other flashes and bursts from the active region on the right as well. Neither event is headed towards Earth.
Credit: NASA/GSFC/SDO
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center enables NASA’s mission through four scientific endeavors: Earth Science, Heliophysics, Solar System Exploration, and Astrophysics. Goddard plays a leading role in NASA’s accomplishments by contributing compelling scientific knowledge to advance the Agency’s mission.
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Comet Lovejoy skimmed across the Sun's edge about 140,000 km above the surface late Dec. 15 and early Dec. 16, 2011, furiously brightening and vaporizing as it approached the Sun. It is the brightest sungrazing comet that SOHO has ever seen, with a nucleus about twice as wide as a football field. It unexpectedly survived the pass and cruised out from behind the Sun some hours later. Comets are ancient balls of dust and ice. There is a temporary, four hour gap in the SOHO data after the comet went behind the occulting disk. We will remake these movies when that data comes in.
Credit: NASA/SDO
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center enables NASA’s mission through four scientific endeavors: Earth Science, Heliophysics, Solar System Exploration, and Astrophysics. Goddard plays a leading role in NASA’s accomplishments by contributing compelling scientific knowledge to advance the Agency’s mission.
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Sabena
Boeing 737-229/Adv
OO-SDO (cn 21177/433)
Photographed at Brussels - National (Zaventem) / Melsbroek (BRU / EBBR / EBMB)
Belgium.
NASA image captured December 6, 2010
To see a video from this event go here: www.flickr.com/photos/gsfc/5241585906/
A magnetic filament snaking around the sun's SE limb just keeps getting longer. The portion visible today stretches more than 700,000 km--a full solar radius. NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory took the above picture during the early hours of Dec 6, 2010.
So far the massive structure has hovered quietly above the stellar surface, but now it is showing signs of instability. Long filaments like this one have been known to collapse with explosive results when they hit the stellar surface below. Further updates will be posted as warranted.
Credit: NASA/SDO
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center enables NASA’s mission through four scientific endeavors: Earth Science, Heliophysics, Solar System Exploration, and Astrophysics. Goddard plays a leading role in NASA’s accomplishments by contributing compelling scientific knowledge to advance the Agency’s mission.
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