NASA Spacecraft Catches a Massive Solar Eruption on Video

NASA periodically catches video of solar flares shooting out of the sun, but this wave of hot plasma ripping across the sun’s surface to create a solar storm is unimaginably huge. If you look closely at the video, the 372,823-mile dark plasma filament (long enough to wrap around the Earth 47 times) erupts and lets out a wave that covers a good distance of the top half of the sun. For reference, the moon is about 238,000 miles from Earth; so while the eruption looks small with the sun shrunken down to fit on your computer screen, it happened on a mind-bogglingly large scale. According to SpaceWeather.com, the charged particles in the coronal mass ejection will just glance the Earth as they pass by tomorrow, and they’ll probably produce some eye-pleasing aurorae. Keep your eyes peeled for more beautiful pictures and Vines from the ISS astronauts tomorrow. (via blastr, image Courtesy of NASA/SDO and the AIA, EVE, and HMI science teams) Previously in space

• A video of Pluto and its moon as New Horizons appraoche
• Rosetta became the first spacecraft to orbit a comet and is sending back awesome pictures
• The James Webb Space Telescope will help us look for aliens, and it’s coming together

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Dan Van Winkle

Dan Van Winkle (he) is an editor and manager who has been working in digital media since 2013, first at now-defunct Geekosystem (RIP), and then at The Mary Sue starting in 2014, specializing in gaming, science, and technology. Outside of his professional experience, he has been active in video game modding and development as a hobby for many years. He lives in North Carolina with Lisa Brown (his wife) and Liz Lemon (their dog), both of whom are the best, and you will regret challenging him at Smash Bros.

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