Polar: PIXIE at Perigee 2 on May 11, 1999 (South)

  • Released Wednesday, December 8, 1999
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On May 11, 1999, the solar wind that blows constantly from the Sun virtually disappeared. Dropping to a small fraction of its normal density and to half its normal speed, the solar wind died down enough to allow physicists to observe particles flowing directly from the Sun's corona to Earth. This severe change in the solar wind also drastically changed the shape of Earth's magnetic field and produced a rare auroral display at Earth's North Pole.

An animation of x-ray images of the South Pole on May 11, 1999 taken by the PIXIE instrument on Polar, indicating enegetic electron fluxes striking the upper atmosphere

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Please give credit for this item to:
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio

This page was originally published on Wednesday, December 8, 1999.
This page was last updated on Wednesday, May 3, 2023 at 1:58 PM EDT.

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