Sequential chromospheric brightenings beneath a transequatorial halo coronal mass ejection

Analyses of multiwavelength data sets for a solar eruption at similar to 21: 30 UT on 2002 December 19 show evidence for the disappearance of a large-scale, transequatorial coronal loop ( TL). In addition, coronal manifestations of the eruption ( based on SOHO EIT and LASCO images) include large-scale coronal dimming, flares in each associated active region in the northern and southern hemispheres, and a halo CME. We present detailed observations of the chromospheric aspects of this event based on H alpha images obtained with the ISOON telescope. The ISOON images reveal distant flare precursor brightenings, sympathetic flares, and, of most interest herein, four nearly cospatial propagating chromospheric brightenings. The speeds of the propagating disturbances causing these brightenings are 600 - 800 km s(-1). The inferred propagating disturbances have some of the characteristics of H alpha and EIT flare waves ( e. g., speed, apparent emanation from the flare site, subsequent filament activation). However, they differ from typical H alpha chromospheric flare waves ( also known as Moreton waves) because of their absence in off-band H alpha images, small angular arc of propagation (< 30 degrees), and their multiplicity. Three of the four propagating disturbances consist of a series of sequential chromospheric brightenings of network points that suddenly brighten in the area beneath the TL that disappeared earlier. SOHO MDI magnetograms show that the successively brightened points that define the inferred propagating disturbances were exclusively of one polarity, corresponding to the dominant polarity of the affected region. We speculate that the sequential chromospheric brightenings represent footpoints of field lines that extend into the corona, where they are energized in sequence by magnetic reconnection as coronal fields tear away from the chromosphere during the eruption of the transequatorial CME. We report briefly on three other events with similar narrow propagating disturbances that were confined to a single hemisphere.