It may look like a Volkswagen Beetle on a hill, but the surprising observation1 shown here—specifically the uppermost set of white contours—has solar physicists cruising toward one of their primary goals: unraveling the mysteries of solar flares. This image of a flare was made by a team of Japanese researchers using the Yohkoh satellite (seePHYSICS TODAY, May 1992, page 19), and the emission represented by those contours is closely related to the origin of the flare's energy.