Douglas Isbell
Headquarters, Washington, DC June 3, 1998
(Phone: 202/358-1547)
Bill Steigerwald
Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD
(Phone: 301/286-5017)
NOTE TO EDITORS: N98-38
SOHO SPACECRAFT SEES TWO COMETS PLUNGE INTO SUN
In a rare celestial spectacle, two comets have been observed
plunging into the Sun's atmosphere in close succession, on June 1
and 2. This unusual event on Earth's own star was followed on
June 2 by a likely unrelated but also dramatic ejection of solar
gas and magnetic fields on the southwest (or lower right) limb of
the Sun.
The observations of the comets and the large erupting
prominence were made by the LASCO coronagraph on the Solar and
Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) spacecraft. Science instruments
on SOHO have discovered more than 50 comets, including many so-
called sun grazers, but none in such close succession. The
eruption of solar gas was directed away from Earth and does not
pose a hazard to our planet or orbiting astronauts.
Video footage of these intriguing events will be uplinked on
the NASA TV Video File at 11 a.m. and 3:55 p.m. EDT on Thursday,
June 4.
Selected images and an image sequence of the new observations
can be found on the World Wide Web at the NASA SOHO Website:
http://umbra.nascom.nasa.gov/comets/SOHO_sungrazers.html
SOHO is a joint undertaking of NASA and the European Space
Agency. Development of the LASCO instrument was coordinated by
the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, DC. Dr. Donald
Michels of the LASCO science team led the team that observed this
rare phenomenon.
NASA Television is carried on GE-2, transponder 9C, 85
degrees West longitude, vertical polarization, frequency 3880 MHz,
audio 6.8 Megahertz.
