The early January coronal mass ejection and the estimate of its arrival to Venus

Font: Arial Bold, 9) On January 8th, 2007, at 14:54UT, a coronal mass ejection (CME) was observed by LASCO C2, onboard SOHO. Latter on the same day, LASCO C3 also observed this CME, which continued moving outward during most of January 9th. SOHO/EIT did not detect any activity on the solar disk during this period, suggesting that the CME was ejected behind the East limb, towards planet Venus. Thus, we expect the CME to reach Venus some few days after its launch. STEREO/SECCHI COR1 and COR2, A & B, coronagraphs also observed the same CME event. Because STEREO was in the early beginning of its mission, both spacecrafts A and B were near the Earth, and it was possible to combine observations from their instruments and SOHO/LASCO. We estimate the travel time of the Jan. 8th-9th (2007) CME from the Sun to Venus using 3 approaches. In the near-future, our estimates should be confirmed when data from Venus Express mission is available.