AR9077: Solar Magnetic Arcade

On 14 July 2000, in Active Region 9077 (AR9077) a major X-class solar flare produced this arcade resembling a popular slinky toy.

Active region 9077 is very near the center of the Sun's visible disk.

"Energetic protons from the flare arrived at Earth about 15 minutes after the eruption," says Gary Heckman, a space weather forecaster at the NOAA Space Environment Center. "This triggered a category S3 radiation storm."

The enormous loops are actually magnetic field lines which trap the glowing, cooling plasma above the relatively dark solar surface.The event also blasted an enormous cloud of energetic charged particles toward planet Earth, triggering magnetic storms (as said above) and dramatic auroral displays.
The false-color image covers an expansive 230,000 by 170,000 kilometer area on the Sun’s surface (Earth’s diameter is about 12,800 kilometers) and was recorded in extreme ultraviolet light.

NASA’s Transition Region And Coronal Explorer, known as TRACE,  observed the event in three colors: the red image shows the ultraviolet continuum, generally characteristic of cool, dense gas; the blue image shows the 171 Å pass band, characteristic of material around 1 million degrees; the green channel – 195 Å, shows material hotter than about 1.5 million degrees up to approximately 10 million degrees.► Credit: TRACE, Stanford-Lockheed ISR, NASA

► Gif via SpacePlasma>> http://spaceplasma.tumblr.com/

References

► A Solar Radiation Storm>>http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2000/ast14jul_2m/

► AR9077: Solar Magnetic Arcade >>http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap000720.html

► TRACE>> http://trace.lmsal.com/