Stunning New Video Reveals 10,000°C Plasma Towers Erupting into Space After Scientists Create 'Fake Eclipse'

NEVER-BEFORE-SEEN footage of the Sun shows incredible towering eruptions exploding into the darkness of space.

It was captured by a daring mission that involves creating an “artificial eclipse” to snap previously impossible views of ‘s star.

Towers of plasma were seen erupting from the SunCredit: ESA The stunning footage gives a rare view of the Sun made possible by creating an artificial eclipseCredit: ESA

The Sun’s corona – the outer layer of its atmosphere – is normally very hard to photograph.

That’s because is vastly more bright , effectively hiding it on images.

One way for astronomers to see the corona was to wait for a , because the Moon blocks the centre of the Sun.

But it’s not ideal to have to way for , which are rare – so scientists turned to using spacecraft instead.

The ‘s uses a pair of spacecraft orbiting Earth.

One of these is an “occulter”, which effectively acts as an artificial Moon that blocks the .

And the other is a “coronagraph”, which is positioned to be in the shadow of the occulter. This is the spacecraft that photographs the corona, which is much fainter than the Sun’s bright centre.

The Proba-3 mission launched back in December 2024, and allows astronomers to capture incredible views of the Sun’s corona.

This particular video is a timelapse of images taken during a five-hour “fake eclipse” from September 2, 2025.

You can see the yellow light all round the Sun, which is the corona as seen by Proba-3.

ESA’s Proba-3 mission uses a pair of spacecraft to create a fake eclipseCredit: ESA One spacecraft will create a total eclipse for the other in space – but it won’t affect the view of the Sun from EarthCredit: ESA / P. Carril

For the spacecraft, the centre would be blocked by the “occulter”.

But for this footage, the scientists have overlaid footage of the solar surface (far brighter and easier to image), which was captured separately by ‘s .

That way, it’s possible to see an almost full view of the Sun, with the corona in stark detail set against a clear view of the solar surface.

And in a rare spectacle, we see three towers of plasma erupt from the Sun.

They’re called prominences, which burst upwards and snap outwards into the darkness of space.

“The corona is extremely hot,” said Andrei Zhukov, of the Royal Observatory of Belgium.

“About two hundred times hotter than the Sun’s surface.

“Sometimes, structures made out of relatively cold plasma (charged gas) are observed near the Sun.

One spacecraft blocks the view of the centre of the Sun for the other, allowing the corona to be imaged successfullyCredit: Wikipedia/ESA The Proba-3 mission launched two spacecraft towards the Sun, which work together as a pairCredit: ESA / P. Carril

“Although these are still around 10,000 degrees Celcius, they are much colder than the surrounding million-degree hot corona – creating what we call a ‘prominence’.”

The prominences expand outwards and “erupt”, according to scientists, sending plasma out in different directions.

It’s seen clearly here in the timelapse, which is made up of a single image taken every five minutes.

And it captured three prominence eruptions over five hours, condensed into a four-second clip.

The plasma towers can be as hot as 10,000C, scientists sayCredit: ESA The corona is a mysterious part of the Sun that is easiest to study during an eclipseCredit: ESA

“Seeing so many prominence eruptions in such a short timeframe is rare,” said Andrei, who is the principal investigator for the ASPIICS coronograph on board the Proba-3 craft.

“So I’m very happy we managed to capture them so clearly during our observation window.”