First picture of the Sun erupting in 'solar tsunami' which sparked incredible Northern Lights displays




Erupting in dazzling whorls of fire, this is the spectacular first image of the sun in the middle of a solar storm.

An ultraviolet camera was able to capture the intergalatic display - which sparked incredible skies around the world this week - in all its glory.

The solar 'tsunami', which sent waves of supercharged gas hurtling 93million miles towards the Earth, prompted mesmerising displays of the Northern Lights.



Incredible: The solar storm on the Sun erupted on Sunday morning and has prompted spectacular skies over the Earth

The Sun's surface erupted early on Sunday morning and blasted tons of plasma- ionised atoms - into interplantary space. It took two days for the atoms to travel the 93million miles to Earth.



NASA captured images of the event, called a coronal mass ejection, from the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO), a spacecraft launched in February.

SDO provides better-than-HD quality views of the Sun at a variety of wavelengths.

This first image, which is false-colour, shows hot solar plasma at temperatures ranging between one to two million kelvins. The dense golden swirl on the left is a solar flare and a coronal mass ejection, which sent a billion-ton cloud of particles hurtling towards Earth.



'We got a beautiful view of this eruption,' said Leon Golub, of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA).

'This eruption is directed right at us, It's the first major Earth-directed eruption in quite some time.'

Incredible: The solar storm on the Sun erupted on Sunday morning and has prompted spectacular skies over the Earth

When a coronal mass ejection reaches Earth, it interacts with our planet's magnetic field, potentially creating a geomagnetic storm. Solar particles stream down the field lines toward Earth's poles.

Those particles collide with atoms of nitrogen and oxygen in the atmosphere, which then glow like miniature neon signs.

The aurorae are normally only visible at high latitudes closer to the Arctic. However, a geomagnetic storm can light up the sky at lower latitudes as it pulls the aurora south.



Parts of northern America, in particular the state of Michigan, were lucky enough to be given clear skies this week and managed to catch the incredible display.

Denmark was also given wonderful views. But though the UK is in the same geomagnetic latitude, British skywatchers missed out.



A stunning photo of the aurora over Denmark by photographer Jesper Groone outside his house

This is because the aurora appears along Earth's geomagnetic latitude rather than geographic latitude.



Earth's geomagnetic Pole is based in northern Canada rather than the North Pole meaning the viewable zone for aurora is tilted so that northern states in the US are much more likely than the UK to see a display. The Sun goes through a regular activity cycle about 11 years long on average. The last solar maximum occurred in 2001. Its latest minimum was particularly weak and long lasting.

This eruption is one of the first signs that the Sun is waking up and heading toward another maximum. The storms are not expected to be much of a threat to satellites or power grids.