Things on the Sun: Zipper, Airplane and Spots

Caption: ISS Solar Transit. Credit: Fred Locklear.

A couple of awesome pictures of the Sun today from amateur astrophotographers: Above is a composite view of the International Space Station transiting across the Sun, making it look like a zipper on the Sun’s face. This great image is by Fred Locklear (zAambOni on Flickr) using a Celestron C6-N and a SPC900NC webcam. Also visible is the big region of sunspots that spewed out dozens of flares this past week. Fred took this image on July 1, 2012.

What else can we find on the Sun?

Caption: A plane crossing the Sun. Credit: Steve Scheer.

This incredible shot of an airplane crossing the Sun was taken by Steve Scheer on July 7, 2012.
“Luck was on my side as I happened to go outside and saw a plane about 90 deg away from the Sun,” Scheer wrote UT, “so I quickly setup the scope, pulled the battery off charge, fitted the camera to the scope, pointed to the Sun and crossed the fingers. Luckily the focus was already set from a previous Moon imaging session as I had literally seconds to spare.”

More spots show up on this image including the monster new Active Region AR1520 on the left, which is larger than Jupiter.

Specs:
Telescope- C102-HD refractor
Camera- 500D with t-ring
Solar filter

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