LASCO Coronal Mass Ejections Lists

Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs) are massive (10^14 to 10^17 grams) bursts of plasma that are ejected from the sun. One of the scientific objectives of LASCO is to understand why these events occur. We do believe that they are caused by instabilities in the solar magnetic field, which is constantly evolving. Another scientific objective is to understand what effects CMEs have in interplanetary space and very importantly what effects CMEs have when they encounter the earth's environment. We know that the energetic CMEs will cause geomagnetic storms and possibly affect electric power transmission lines.

We have generated a number of lists of CMEs - when they occurred and some parameters describing them. You can follow any of the links below. They should be used with caution, however, as the list may not be correct. We have tried to be as accurate as possible, but errors are possible. We strongly encourage users to look at the images and movies themselves to verify on their own the information in the catalog.

Final CME Catalogs

Dr. Chris St.Cyr completed updating the preliminary 1/1996-6/1998 lists by more detailed analysis of CMEs detected in the LASCO C2/C3 images. This is available at:
Version 2 CME lists for 1/1996 - 6/1998

Dr. Seiji Yashiro has created a CME catalog for all LASCO C2 and C3 CME data. This includes Time-Height plots for velocities, and Javascript Movies for each entry.
CME Catalog

Halo CME archives

The following .zip files are available for download:

PRELIMINARY LISTS

A preliminary list of events has been generated with the LASCO data. This is not necessarily complete, but should contain all of the biggest events. The list is divided by year. These lists are provided for researchers with complementary data who wish to collaborate with members of the LASCO team.

Over the course of the mission, the research scientists have maintained the CME lists. They are listed below:

  • Dr. Chris St.Cyr -- Mission start (Dec 1995) through October 1998
  • Dr. Simon Plunkett -- October 1998 until January 2001
  • Dr. Gareth Lawrence -- January 1, 2001 through December 2003
  • Dr. Guillermo Stenborg -- January 1, 2004 through January 2010

Preliminary CME list for 1/1998 - 12/1998
Preliminary CME list for 1/1999 - 12/1999
Preliminary CME list for 1/2000 - 12/2000
Preliminary CME list for 1/2001 - 12/2001
Preliminary CME list for 1/2002 - 12/2002
Preliminary CME list for 1/2003 - 12/2003
Preliminary CME list for 1/2004 - 12/2004
Preliminary CME list for 1/2005 - 12/2005
Preliminary CME list for 1/2006 - 12/2006
Preliminary CME list for 1/2007 - 12/2007
Preliminary CME list for 1/2008 - 12/2008
Preliminary CME list for 1/2009 - 12/2009
Preliminary CME list for 1/2010

Please note that LASCO CME lists are no longer updated by the LASCO operations team due to changes in funding of the mission. A comprehensive and up-to-date list of CME data is maintained at the CDAW site.