A pincer-shaped plasma sheet at Uranus

An MHD simulation of the terrestrial magnetosphere, rescaled to represent the Uranian magnetotail, is carried out. The 3p immersion can be explained in terms of possible extreme departures from average plasma sheet shapes in the Uranian magnetosphere. The orientation of the Uranian dipole and rotation axes produce a dynamically curved plasma sheet which is an unusual feature of the Uranian magnetosphere.