Magnetic Reconnection Scenario of the Bastille Day 2000 Flare

Abstract

On the basis of Yohkoh Hard X-Ray Telescope data and the magnetograms taken by the SOHO Michelson Doppler Imager and the Solar Magnetic Field Telescope at Huairou Solar Observing Station, we suggest an interpretation of the well-observed Day 2000 flare. The large-scale structure and dynamics of the flare, as seen in hard X-rays, can be explained in terms of the three-dimensional reconnection at a separator in the corona. More specifically, we suggest that before occurrence of two-ribbon flares with significant decrease of a distance between the hard X-ray (HXR) footpoints, like the Bastille Day flare, the bases of magnetic field separatrices are moved by the large-scale photospheric flows of two types. First, the shear flows, which are parallel to the photospheric neutral line, increase the length of field lines in the corona and produce an excess of magnetic energy. Second, the converging flows, i.e., the flows directed to the neutral line, create the preflare current layers in the corona and provide an excess of energy sufficient to produce a large flare. During the flare, both excesses of magnetic energy are released completely or partially. In the Bastille Day flare, the model describes two kinds of apparent motions of the HXR kernels. One is an increase of a distance between the flare ribbons in which the HXR kernels appear. The effect results from fast reconnection in a coronal current layer. The second effect is a decrease of the distance between the kernels moving to each other as a result of relaxation of magnetic tensions generated by the photospheric shear flows.