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Post by dboyseeker on Nov 25, 2009 9:12:37 GMT 10
November 24, 2009: Sometimes you really can believe your eyes. That's what NASA's STEREO (Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory) spacecraft are telling researchers about a controversial phenomenon on the sun known as the "solar tsunami." Years ago, when solar physicists first witnessed a towering wave of hot plasma racing along the sun's surface, they doubted their senses. The scale of the thing was staggering. It rose up higher than Earth itself and rippled out from a central point in a circular pattern millions of kilometers in circumference. Skeptical observers suggested it might be a shadow of some kind—a trick of the eye—but surely not a real wave. "Now we know," says Joe Gurman of the Solar Physics Lab at the Goddard Space Flight Center. "Solar tsunamis are real." The twin STEREO spacecraft confirmed their reality in February 2009 when sunspot 11012 unexpectedly erupted. The blast hurled a billion-ton cloud of gas (a "CME") into space and sent a tsunami racing along the sun's surface. STEREO recorded the wave from two positions separated by 90o, giving researchers an unprecedented view of the event. To read more >>> science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2009/24nov_solartsunami.htm?list66646
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Post by brillbilly on Nov 25, 2009 9:15:24 GMT 10
nice thread ,get out the surfboards
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Post by shatnerswig on Nov 25, 2009 10:12:25 GMT 10
goin down to the sun where the waves are big and hot .....surf surf ... solar sunami....
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Post by Aardvaaks on Nov 26, 2009 8:34:19 GMT 10
Dont they call these blasts erupting up from the suns surface Plasma bolts?
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Nov 26, 2009 9:31:17 GMT 10
The old Coronal Mass Ejections eh? Those pictures are increadable, almost looks like a collision of some sort, something impacting the sun.
I thought a sunspot that big would have played havoc with telecomunications and electricity supplies.
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