WATCH: Huge portion of the Sun breaks off from the surface, swirls around its North Pole

Talk about Polar Vortex! Material from a northern prominence just broke away from the main filament & is now circulating in a massive polar vortex around the north pole of our Star. Implications for understanding the Sun’s atmospheric dynamics above 55° here cannot be overstated! pic.twitter.com/1SKhunaXvP

— Dr. Tamitha Skov (@TamithaSkov) February 2, 2023

Scientists have been perplexed by a new development on the Sun’s surface. A massive chunk of the Sun’s surface broke off, and formed a tornado-like whirl around its North Pole. Though scientists are still attempting to figure out how this happened, the footage of the event has startled the space community.

Space weather forecaster Tamitha Skov shared a video sequence to Twitter late last week that shows a huge filament of solar plasma breaking free from the Sun’s surface.

“Talk about polar vortex! Material from a northern prominence just broke away from the main filament & is now circulating in a massive polar vortex around the north pole of our star,” she tweeted of the footage, taken by NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory.

“Over 55° here, the implications for understanding the sun’s atmospheric processes cannot be emphasised!”

According to Space.com, this is the first time such a vortex has been spotted, due to the James Webb Space Telescope’s exceptional capabilities. While scientists have seen filaments break out from the Sun before, this is the first time they’ve seen one generate a polar whirlwind.

Scott McIntosh, a solar physicist and deputy director of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado, told Space.com that while he’s never seen a vortex like this, he does know that something weird happens once every solar cycle, or 11 years, near the Sun’s 55 degree latitude.