Coronal explosions

We searched for a new phenomenon, called coronal explosions, in three solar flares, and found them in all three. A coronal explosion is the propagation of a density wave through the flaring area. The wave emerges from one or two small areas (the sources) which are close to, but not identical with the sources of hard X-ray burst emission. In all three cases the explosion starts at the end of the impulsive phase, during or after the last hard ( 20 keV) X-ray burst. The velocities of propagation range between 1800 and a few tens of km s^-1, and tend to decrease with time. We suggest that the bursts are magneto-hydrodynamical (shock) waves moving downward into denser regions.