Colossal Eruption Carves ‘Canyon of Fire’ Onto the Sun’s Surface
On July 15, a solar filament erupted from the Sun’s upper left side, ejecting a powerful blast of plasma and magnetic fields into space. The resulting explosion was so massive that it seared a deep, fiery scar of hot plasma and debris onto the star’s visible surface. While filament eruptions aren’t uncommon, astronomers had already been watching an unusually large filament—cold, dense ribbons of gas suspended above the Sun’s surface—that they spotted days before the explosion. When the filament