Prevalence of magnetic reconnection at small field shear angles in the solar wind

A study of magnetic reconnection exhausts observed at high (3‐s) temporal resolution by the plasma and magnetic field experiments on Wind during March 2006 reveals, unexpectedly, that reconnection in the solar wind occurs most frequently at field shear angles <90°. Owing largely to the relatively low reconnection rates associated with small field shear angles, the corresponding exhausts tend to be quite narrow (<4 × 10 4 km) and typically are convected past the spacecraft by the solar wind flow in <100 s. During March 2006 Wind encountered reconnection exhausts at an average rate of ∼1.5 events/day, a factor of ∼36 greater than has been inferred from previous observations, largely made at considerably lower (∼1‐min) temporal resolution.