Solar Vortex Cavity Events

No conclusions drawn here, but this is definitely worth checking out...

I happened to be watching a solar weather channel today (Feb. 9th 2019) when I noticed something bizarre on the vanishing limb of the Sun:

I thought enough of it that snapped a capture image and posted it (below) on Facebook's Cosmogenesis Group.

I commented on the dark shadow, wondering it it was an artifice of the photo, or an actual event - perhaps a thinning of the solar coronal atmosphere.

Shortly thereafter, member Roger Mascetti posted this reply (below,) a video of the Sun from March 11, 2012:

Thinking there was an outside chance this might have been an overly tampered picture, I looked for another video of the Sun from March 11, 2012 event - and found it (below):

So - not likely to be a forgery.

Then I looked a little further and found a blow-up of the Sun from March 11, 2012 event, and this one showed a blow-up with TWO similar events, although one was very brief (can be seen to the left of the prominent event.)

Looking a little further, I found a paper on the subject, "Coronal Prominence Cavities"

but it did not really cast anymore light on what was going on.

I am intrigued that I never saw or heard of this before. That objects this pronounced appear to be locked onto the sun, then the sudden release, leaves me gobsmacked!

Stephen Goodfellow, Feb. 9th, 2019

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