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My friend showed me a video of a CME that looked as if it was swirling into a gigantic circular "spaceship" or "UFO" and he explained it as "an alien ship potentially refueling". I did a bit of research and I know assumed the images he was showing me were from SETI SOHO and they were yellow, meaning it was obviously only a single or a couple wavelengths of light shown (possibly UV?).

https://youtu.be/YnzZLNsSGyY

disclaimer: this clip is overly-liberal in its subtitles...

If yoy habe the original source that would be awesome.

Making a total BLIND guess- I'd say the plasma was swirling into the filament of the CME before it reached a critical mass to be pushed away from the sun? Once departed from the energy of the sun under certain conditions it would no longer show because it wouldn't have enough energy to emit the correct wavelength of light?

Am I even remotely correct? Obviously the space ship explanation has no merit- it's just from some dude. Hoping to get a clarification on the video, I do not believe it is a "UFO refueling" heh. Im not a conspiracy nut, and neither is my bud- so we're looking for a science answer :).

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    $\begingroup$ That smaller circle is nothing - pure pareidolia (look at the slow motion enlargement) $\endgroup$
    – user1569
    Sep 28 '18 at 15:28
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    $\begingroup$ Damn brain- always thinks its one step ahead when its actually 10 steps behind. $\endgroup$
    – Magic Octopus Urn
    Sep 28 '18 at 15:43
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It's a polar crown cavity or coronal prominence cavity. Here is another Youtube video explaining it. It references A new look at a polar crown cavity as observed by SDO/AIA

Conclusions. We propose to define a polar crown cavity as a density depletion sitting above denser polar crown filament plasma drained down the cavity due to gravity. As part of the polar crown filament, plasma at different temperatures (ranging from 50000K to 0.6 MK) is observed at the same location on the cavity dips and sustained by a competition between the gravity and the curvature of magnetic field lines. The eruption of the polar crown cavity as a solid body can be decomposed into two phases: a slow rise at a speed of 0.6 km/s, and an acceleration phase at a mean speed of 25 km/s

The video on this page shows one forming nicely.

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  • $\begingroup$ Wow neat! I understand very little of that though- admittedly. Thanks for another video with the name of the phenomanon. This will let me research it at my own speed. Was very hard to find the original source when all I had to go on was "OMG UFO!!!" heh... $\endgroup$
    – Magic Octopus Urn
    Sep 28 '18 at 15:42
  • $\begingroup$ My search term came from the comments under the video. Yes, they are (many and) horrible under Youtube videos, but sometimes the lead is there. $\endgroup$
    – user1569
    Sep 28 '18 at 17:44
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    $\begingroup$ no lie there hah! The thought, "hmm... Ill check the youtube comments for more info" has occured once in my life, the first time I ever used the site. Never looked again. $\endgroup$
    – Magic Octopus Urn
    Sep 28 '18 at 18:23

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