STEREO Sends Back First Solar Images

NASA's twin Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatories (STEREO) sent back their first images of the sun this week and with them a view into the sun's mounting activity.

One image shows the first coronal mass ejection (CME) observed by STEREO's Ahead spacecraft, taken Dec. 9.

"We're absolutely thrilled. We've been looking forward to STEREO's unique vantage point for over 10 years now and the community couldn't be happier with these first views," said Michael Kaiser, STEREO project scientist at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.

"Now we're holding our breath to see what the next big CME looks like in 3-D, so we can really start to answer some interesting questions."

After a successful launch on Oct. 25 from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fla., STEREO spent the first few minutes separating from its stacked configuration aboard the single Delta II rocket. Shortly afterwards, mission operations personnel at The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, (APL) Laurel, Md., monitored the two observatories as they traveled in an elliptical orbit from a point close to Earth to one extending just beyond the moon.

source: nasa.gov