A Giant Breach in Earth's Magnetic Field

Themis discovers hole in Earth's solar storm shield a.k.a. the magnetosphere.

"NASA's five THEMIS spacecraft have discovered a breach in Earth's magnetic field ten times larger than anything previously thought to exist." [...] "At first I didn't believe it," says THEMIS project scientist David Sibeck of the Goddard Space Flight Center. "This finding fundamentally alters our understanding of the solar wind-magnetosphere interaction." ...Read more below

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2008/16dec_giantbreach.htm

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/themis/news/themis_leaky_shield.html

The 2007 THEMIS Mission: investigate what causes auroras in the Earth's atmosphere to dramatically change from slowly shimmering waves of light to wildly shifting streaks of color. Discovering what causes auroras to change will provide scientists with important details on how the planet's magnetosphere works and the important Sun-Earth connection.