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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_(atmospheric_phenomenon) Steve (atmospheric phenomenon)From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia This image of Steve was taken Aug. 17, 2015 at Little Bow Resort, AB, Canada. Photo by Elfie Hall.Steve is an atmospheric optical phenomenon, which appears as a light ribbon in the sky, discovered in 2017 by aurora watchers from Alberta, Canada. According to Eric Donovan's analysis of the Swarm satellite data, it was caused by a 25 km wide ribbon of hot gasses at an altitude of 300 km, temperature of 3000 °C and flowing at a speed of 6 km/s (compared to 10 m/s outside the ribbon). The phenomenon is not rare, but nobody had looked into it in detail prior to that.[1][2]
Originally the aurora watchers attributed the phenomenon to a proton aurora and erroneously called them "proton arcs",[3] but when physics professor Eric Donovan from the University of Calgary saw the pictures, he suspected that was not the case, as proton auroras are not visible.[4] As he correlated the time and location of the phenomenon with European Space Agency (ESA)'s Swarm satellite data, the phenomenon was very clearly distinguished. More details will be published by Donovan and his team later, including the suspected cause of the phenomenon.[1]
The name "Steve" was chosen from a clip in the Over the Hedge animated comedy movie of 2006, where characters are choosing a name for something unknown.[5]
A member of Alberta Aurora Chasers suggested "Strong Thermal Emission Velocity Enhancement" as a backronym of STEVE.[6]
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