How two satellites are mimicking total solar eclipses in space
Cape Monster, Fla. – A pair of European satellites He created the first artificial one solar eclipses Flying in a definite and fancy formation, providing optional integrity for scientists for hours.
The European Space Agency released Eclipse pictures at the Paris Air Show on Monday. Orbit duo released at the end of last year was simulated solar eclipses Since March, tens of thousands of miles (kilometers) zoom on earth.
With 492 feet (150 meters) intervals, a satellite sun blocks the sun as he did during a natural Total Solar Eclipse The other is that it targets the telescope CoronaThe external atmosphere of the sun that forms a crown or light halo.
A complex, long dance, less than 1.5 meters, requiring extreme sensitivity by cube -shaped spacecraft. Flying accuracy must only be within the millimeter, a nail thickness. This meticulous positioning is obtained as autonomously through GPS navigation, star viewers, lasers and radio connections.
Dubbed Proma-3 has produced 10 successful solar eclipses so far during the ongoing payment phase. He said that the longest eclipse lasted for five hours, Andrei Zhukov, the chief scientist of the Corona observer telescope, who is in orbit of Belgium’s Royal Observatory. O and his team aim to have a large six -hour integrity per eclipse after scientific observations have begun.
Scientists are already excited about the preliminary results that show Corona without the need to process a special image.
Im We almost couldn’t believe our eyes, Z Zhukov said with a e -mail. “This was the first attempt and it worked. It was very amazing.”
Zhukov predicts that an average of two solar eclips per week is produced for approximately 200 a week during a two -year mission and provides more than 1,000 hours of sum. This will be a scientific bonanza, because the full solar eclipses produce only a few minutes of integrity when the moon is perfectly ranked between the world and the sun – an average of 18 months.
It continues to hide the solar scientists, especially the hero, which is warmer than the sun surface. Coronal mass additions cause billions of tons of plasma and magnetic fields to be launched into space. Geomanynetic storms can disrupt power and communication while illuminating the night sky with Auroras in unexpected places.
The previous satellites produced imitation solar eclipses, including the European Space Agency and NASA’s Solar Orbiter and Soho Observatory, while the sun blocking disk was always in the same spacecraft as the telescope that observes the corona. What makes this task unique, Zhukov said that the sun -raying disc and telescope is on two different satellites and therefore away from each other.
The distance between these two satellites will provide scientists a better view of the Korona closest to the sun’s limb.
ESA’s mission manager Damien Galano, Paris Air Show, “We are extremely satisfied with the quality of these images and again thanks to the formation flight,” he said.
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AP journalist John Leicester contributed to this report from Paris.
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