VIDEO: Check out this incredible solar eruption through the eyes of a spacecraft
Our Sun released a highly energetic stream of material that was tracked by ten NASA and ESA missions
Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Centre / Scott Wiessinger
On the 14 October 2014, a Coronal Mass Ejection (CME) left the Sun and made its way through space. On its journey, the eruption was detected by ten NASA and European Space Agency (ESA) missions.
The CME was first detected by the Venus Express (VEX) on the 16 October 2014 at a distance of 0.72 Astronomical Units (AU). One AU is the distance the Earth is from the Sun, meaning that the CME had travelled 72 per cent of the Earth’s orbit in two days. The final detection was in March 2016 by the Voyager 2 spacecraft, and amazing 111 AU away. Scientists hope this will improve our understanding of CMEs and how they travel through space, as this can have major implications about how it reacts with the Earth’s magnetic field.
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