On August 31, 2012, a long filament of solar material that had been hovering in the sun's atmosphere, the corona, erupted out into space at 4:36 p.m. EDT. The coronal mass ejection, or CME, traveled at over 900 miles per second. The CME did not travel directly toward Earth, but did connect with Earth's magnetic environment, or magnetosphere, causing aurora to appear on the night of Monday, September 3. (Photo by NASA/GSFC/SDO via The Atlantic)

An elephant “kisses” a visitor during a show at an elephant training school in Xishuangbanna, Yunnan province, April 18, 2015. Some 16 elephants live at the school and give four 30-minute performances everyday for visitors. (Photo by Wong Campion/Reuters)

A man works on a small replica of the Iron Man armor next to a homemade replica of the “Hulkbuster” Iron Man armour from the movie “Avengers: Age of Ultron”, at an underground parking lot in Zhengzhou, Henan province, China, May 12, 2015. The 3.4-metre-tall replica is made of over 100 fiber-reinforced plastic components. It took Xing and his friends two months to put them together after watching the trailer of the movie in March, local media reported. (Photo by Reuters/Stringer)

A Naga sadhu, or naked Hindu holy man, performs a ritual inside his tent during Kumbh Mela, or Pitcher festival, at Trimbakeshwar, India, Friday, August 28, 2015. Hindus believe taking a dip in the waters of a holy river during the festival will cleanse them of their sins. The festival is held four times every 12 years. (Photo by Rajanish Kakade/AP Photo)

People carry their pets before the start of a pet blessing at Greenhills shopping mall in Manila October 3, 2015. Pets were blessed on Saturday in a celebration honouring the patron saint of animals Saint Francis of Assisi. (Photo by Romeo Ranoco/Reuters)

Military school cadets take part in a ceremony commemorating the 56th anniversary of the death of Camilo Cienfuegos who, along with Fidel Castro and Che Guevara, was a chief commander of the Cuban revolution in Havana, Cuba on October 28, 2015. (Photo by Xinhua/REX Shutterstock)

“A huge wasp measuring 2.5 inches in length, visiting the banana tree in my front yard”. (Photo and comment by John Matzick, USA/2013 Sony World Photography Awards via The Atlantic)

A person dressed as “bigfoot” makes their way through the strong wind and snow in the Back Bay neighborhood during a blizzard on January 27, 2015 in Boston, Massachusetts. (Photo by Kayana Szymczak/Getty Images)