• Email Us: [email protected]
  • Contact Us: +1 718 874 1545
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Medical Market Report

  • Home
  • All Reports
  • About Us
  • Contact Us

Next Month’s Total Solar Eclipse Could Come With Rare Bright Pink Streamers

March 28, 2024 by Deborah Bloomfield

There is a reason some people chase solar eclipses around the world: this is definitely not a phenomenon where if you’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all. Instead, each solar eclipse is different, and the April 8 North American total solar eclipse will likely come with a few extra features, including an abundance of red, pink, and possibly white streamers and loops.

The upcoming solar eclipse will be longer than most and will occur when several planets, and maybe even a comet, are in the sky, adding to the show at totality. However, perhaps the most distinctive feature of this eclipse is that it is happening so close to solar maximum, when the chances of flares and coronal mass ejections (CMEs) are highest.

Advertisement

Solar storms are hard to predict, certainly more than a week in advance, so we don’t yet know if there will be activity while the Sun is blocked by the Moon, offering us a chance to see its corona. However, we know that, statistically, the chances are much higher now than during the last total solar eclipse in the US in 2017, when solar activity was on the decline from a peak much lower than this one.

Solar prominences seen during the last total eclipse of the last millennium, as seen from France.

Red prominences from Chile during the 2019 total eclipse. The prominences can only be seen during eclipses or using hydrogen alpha filters, which hide the red color.

Image credit: ESA/CESAR

Solar maximum is a product of the 22-year cycle of the Sun’s magnetic field, during which two peaks occur around 11 years apart. Right now, that magnetic field is tangled, producing sunspots, flares, and the CMEs that cause auroras.

Even when solar activity is at a minimum, prominences can be seen around the edge of the Sun, either using hydrogen alpha filters or when the Moon blocks most of the Sun’s light. This time, however, they should be much longer and more abundant, looking like streamers pointing away from the Sun, often appearing red and pink. If a flare times itself well, you may see it lifting off the Sun. CMEs are rarer, but can be visible for much longer; if any occur before the eclipse, they could still be seen.

A solar prominence in 2010 compared to the size of the Earth

A solar prominence in 2010 compared to the size of the Earth.

Image credit: NASA Solar Dynamics Observatory

The 2023 solar eclipse that touched the coast of Australia included a fine display of prominences. The Sun was less active at that point than it is today, and the eclipse was also a great deal shorter.

Advertisement

Prominences are usually longer than the diameter of the Earth, and some have been as long as the width of the Sun. Most often one end is tethered to the Sun, creating a streamer effect, but sometimes occurs as an arch, often with both ends anchored to sunspot regions. 

Although there is some uncertainty about their causes, prominences are composed of hydrogen and helium like the Sun itself, and are held up against gravity by magnetic fields. Rarer coronal loops can resemble an arched prominence in shape, but are much hotter.

Prominences emit light in the red part of the spectrum as a result of the hydrogen alpha transition. However, combined with white light from ordinary thermal emissions, it can produce a pink effect.

The diamond ring seen during the 2017 eclipse from Oregan State Fair Grounds

The diamond ring seen during the 2017 eclipse from Oregon State Fair Grounds.

Image credit: Dominic Hart/NASA

All of these are separate from the regular eclipse phenomena of the Diamond Ring effect, caused by a thin slither of unblocked Sun, and Baily’s Beads, visible when valleys between lunar mountains allow pockets of sunlight to stream through.

Deborah Bloomfield
Deborah Bloomfield

Related posts:

  1. Shell weighs ‘jab or job’ policy for employees -document
  2. Vietnam willing to share information with China for its bid to join CPTPP
  3. Goldman Sachs spinoff Juven to back African high-growth companies with large checks
  4. World’s Smallest Skin Cancer Detected At Just 0.65 Millimeters

Source Link: Next Month's Total Solar Eclipse Could Come With Rare Bright Pink Streamers

Filed Under: News

Primary Sidebar

  • DNA From Greenland Sled Dogs – Maybe The World’s Oldest Breed – Reveals 1,000 Years Of Arctic History
  • Why Doesn’t Moonrise Shift By The Same Amount Each Night?
  • Moa De-Extinction, Fashionable Chimps, And Robot Surgery – No Human Required
  • “Human”: Powerful New Images Mark The Most Scientifically Accurate “Hyper-Real 3D Models Of Human Species Ever”
  • Did We Accidentally Leave Life On The Moon In 2019 – And Could We Revive It?
  • 1.8 Million Years Ago, Two Extinct Humans Had One Of The Gnarliest Deaths In History
  • “Powerful Image” Of One Of The World’s Rarest Tigers Exposes The Real Danger In Taman Negara
  • Evolution, Domestication, And A Lot Of Very Good Boys: How Wolves Became Dogs
  • Why Do Orcas Have White Spots Near Their Eyes?
  • Tomb Of First King Of Ancient Maya City Discovered In Belize
  • The Real Reason The Tip Of Your Tape Measure Wiggles Like That
  • The “Haunting” Last Message From NASA’s Opportunity Rover, Sent From Inside A Planet-Wide Storm
  • Adorable Video Proves Not All Gorillas Hate The Rain. It Might Even Win One A Mate
  • 5,000-Year-Old Rock Art May Show One Of Ancient Egypt’s First Rulers
  • Alzheimer’s-Linked Protein Levels “20 Times Higher” In Newborn Babies – What Does This Mean?
  • Americans Were Asked If They Thought Civil War Was Coming. The Results Were Unexpected
  • Voyager 1 & 2 Could Be Detected From Almost A Light-Year Away With Our Current Technology
  • Dams Have Nudged Earth’s Poles By Over 1 Meter In The Past 200 Years
  • This Sugar Could Be A Cure For Male Pattern Baldness – And It’s Been In Our Bodies All Along
  • “Cosmic Immigrants”: Daytime Star Seen In 1604 May Be An “Alien Type Ia Supernova”
  • Business
  • Health
  • News
  • Science
  • Technology
  • +1 718 874 1545
  • +91 78878 22626
  • [email protected]
Office Address
Prudour Pvt. Ltd. 420 Lexington Avenue Suite 300 New York City, NY 10170.

Powered by Prudour Network

Copyrights © 2025 · Medical Market Report. All Rights Reserved.

Go to mobile version