A Complex, Fast-Developing Limb Prominence
On October 19, with the sun just free of a neighbor's tall poplars, the
main attraction was an isolated prominence and associated filament. Here's
the view at 11:45. This is the first time I've traced a dusky,
cobweb-like filament beyond the limb where it turned into a striated
prominence. The seeing this morning was dreadful -- fast and very
turbulent behind a severe, fast-moving cold front. Crisp and sparkling
skies sound inviting, but I had to wait several minutes for every
steady glimpse of detail.
A Solar ClickShow
I returned to the eyepiece an hour later to see if anything new was
going on. Was it! The seeing had settled down, but the real news
was on the sun. Where there had been one interesting prominence, now
there were three spectacular ones. Two tall ribbons were linked by
long, looping, very dim "kinks" of glowing hydrogen. These are by
far the largest structures I've ever seen on the sun. In the place
of this morning's unassuming prominence was a very bright, very detailed
knot of bright gas showing extraordinarily complex internal
structure. Not only that: It Moved!
Try the following chain of pages. A drawing per minute would have
been better, but these sketches are about five minutes apart.
Take me home!