A&A Supplement series, Vol. 129, May I 1998, 553-561
Received May 30, 1995; accepted September 4, 1997
J.Y. Xuan
- X.M. Gu
- J. Lin -
Y.C. Jiang - S.H. Zhong - Y.S. Li
CCAST (World Laboratory), P.O. Box 8730, Beijing 100080, China
Yunnan Observatory, P.O. Box 110, Kunming 650011, China
Some properties of the white light flare (WLF) that occurred on 18 January
1989 are presented. The flare consisted of 7 patched-shape kernels, with
sizes 
cm2. The lifetimes of the kernels
were from several minutes to more than 40 minutes. The initial bright
points of the WLF kernels originated between the umbra and penumbra, in
penumbra fibrils, between penumbra fibrils and the photosphere, or on the
photosphere and light bridge. These kernels appeared 2 to 3 minutes after
H
flares, and reached their maxima respectively before the first
maximum and 1 to 2 minutes before the second maximum of the H flare,
and disappeared slowly before the disappearance of the H flare.
The direction and size of material motion in the kernels are
different. The precursors of the WLF are similar to those of ordinary flares.
The magnetic pattern of the photosphere in the active region is in 
-
structure, and the kernels lie at or near the changing magnetic neutral lines.
The small longitudinal field gradient may be constrained by the small
transverse field on the photosphere. The flare exhibited both temporal and
spatial properties in the center reversal and line-width of H profiles,
and has characteristics of both class I and II. Thus it may be a
mixed-class white light flare.
keywords: sun: flares