[Liaison]

The Sun blowing off some energy and a sizable amount of plasma is not as scary as that pulsar. I would not want to be within 100 parsecs of that thing as the earth would look like a toasted marshmallow at a scout picnic.

[dragnet2]

Speaking of pulsars and supernova, I shot this one of the M-1 Nebula not long ago.

This is about 6400 lights years distance from us.

It was reportedly first seen as a bright supernova by the Chinese in 1054.

M-1 Nebula - 14x60sec, ISO800-Combined, calibrated and stacked, w/ 6.3 FR and LP filters.

M1 is the remnant of a star that exploded as a supernova. At the center of the nebula lies the Crab Pulsar, a neutron star about 30 km across, with a spin rate of 30.2 times per second.

Pulsars are indeed scary.