Hi Steve and everyone,

I can't post the pic, because it is actually video - if it is possible to embed it using vBulletin tags, i'm afraid i don't know how. However, here is direct youtube link for a large view in your browser:

A Solar Ballet (YouTube Video by NASA)

You will also find the video embedded at the APOD page, at the following URL:

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap130115.html

Explanation: Sometimes, the Sun itself seems to dance. On just this past New Year's Eve, for example, NASA's Sun-orbiting Solar Dynamic Observatory spacecraft imaged an impressive prominence erupting from the Sun's surface. The dramatic explosion was captured in ultraviolet light in the above time lapse video covering four hours. Of particular interest is the tangled magnetic field that directs a type of solar ballet for the hot plasma as it falls back to the Sun. The scale of the disintegrating prominence is huge -- the entire Earth would easily fit under the flowing curtain of hot gas. A quiescent prominence typically lasts about a month, and may erupt in a Coronal Mass Ejection (CME) expelling hot gas into the Solar System. The energy mechanism that creates a solar prominence is still a topic of research. As the Sun nears Solar Maximum this year, solar activity like eruptive prominences should be common.

========================

I'd never seen a solar flare "close up" like this... it looks like a red geyser to me! and you can see the "outer part" of the sun's gases too... pretty neat, but quite foreboding! ... wouldn't want to stick my finger in that!

~ waves ~