giant eruptions from the Sun

Here is an image of a prominence erupting. It was taken with the EIT instrument on SOHO, which records ultraviolet radiation from helium atoms.

Below is a movie of a prominence erupting.

And here’s a picture of the grand-daddy of all prominences. It reached a height of 200,000 km above the solar surface! We can learn more about prominences if we observe them at many different wavelengths.

Below is another movie of a prominence eruption in white light (Courtesy of the High Altitude Observatory).

To see just how violent the Sun can be, join Mark and Alexi for their adventure into Storms from the Sun