June 14, 2017: Solar lunchtime

[michael.h.f.wilkinson]

Glorious sunshine today, so we had lunch outside with the SolarMax-II 60, used both in single-stack and in double-stack mode. Somehow the views were better in single-stack mode today, although DS mode did increase contrast in the few plage areas that were about, single-stack was much brighter, and unsurprisingly showed the proms, but also the sunspot better. Some big proms were showing on the eastern limb, and together with the nearby sunspot these formed the main attraction. There were also a few filaments, both high up northwards, but also in the south-west. A fairly lonely plage area could be seen west and south of the sunspot. Various students had a look, and it is always fun to watch the look on their face when they comment that the sunspot is quite small, and I answer "Yes, only about the size of planet Earth".