SDO Observes a Coronal Mass Ejection
Why does the Sun throw stuff at us? The Sun’s surface is a churning soup of energetic electrons and ions called plasma . The motion of those charged particles creates magnetic field loops that are larger than the Earth . These loops twist, turn, and trap plasma. The featured time-lapse, taken over 2 hours on April 24th, 2026 by the Solar Dynamics Observatory , shows what happens when those magnetic fields become too stressed: they snap and expel billions of tons (trillions of kilograms) of plasma into space at millions of miles (or kilometers) per hour in what is called a coronal mass ejection (CME). The Sun releases a few CMEs each day when it is at the peak of its activity cycle , which passed in 2025. Some of these eruptions hit Earth and can disrupt power grids, disable satellites, and endanger astronauts, which is why space weather monitoring is so important.