Argentina-based astronomer Eduardo Schaberger Poupeau captured a structure that looked like a plasma waterfall on the surface of the sun. The pictures of the sun were clicked by the astrophotographer on March 9, it shows an enormous wall of plasma falling down toward the sun's surface at fast speeds, according to LiveScience.
Mr Poupeau used specialised camera equipment to capture the striking image. The plasma wall "rose some 100,000 km (62,000 miles) above the solar surface," Mr Poupeau told Spaceweather.com. That is as tall as around eight Earth stacked on top of one another.
He added, "On my computer screen, it looked like hundreds of threads of plasma were dripping down a wall."
Well, according to reports these structures have been seen on the sun many times before. They frequently appear in rings around the sun's poles, and are called "polar crown prominences (PCP)."
According to LiveScience, PCPs are similar to normal solar prominences, which are loops of plasma, or ionized gas, that is ejected from the solar surface by magnetic fields. However, PCPs occur near the sun's magnetic poles at latitudes between 60 and 70 degrees North and South, which often causes them to collapse back towards the sun because the magnetic fields near the poles are much stronger, according to NASA. This collapse back to the sun has earned them the nickname "plasma waterfalls."
"Instead of Northern Lights, however, the sun's ovals are filled with dancing sheets of plasma," per a NASA blog post.
Space.com says that the plasma is falling back down at tremendous speeds - up to 22,370 mph.
from NDTV News- Topstories https://ift.tt/65mWaTw
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