Solar blast could trigger aurora Tuesday night

August 2, 2010

A large solar eruption early Sunday morning launched tons of ionized atoms toward the Earth, and solar scientists say that wave of charged solar debris could trigger auroral displays across the northern United States this week.

The eruption was rated a C-3, comparatively small, but it launched a large filament of solar material into space.

"This eruption is directed right at us, and is expected to get here early in the day on Aug. 4th," said astronomer Leon Golub, of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics.

The sun, which has an 11-year cycle of activity, is just beginning to rebound from an unually long and quiet "solar minimum," so eruptions on this scale have not been seen for several years. the rest

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