Early Tuesday morning I noticed others tweeting about northern lights, so I checked 3D Sun app on my phone, and sure enough, there was a moderate solar storm underway. Kp was at 6, which is huge, since 1 or 2 is more typical in an average night where you can’t see anything here. People in Montana and further south probably had a good night, because the lights were south of overhead 90 degrees in Regina at about 54 degrees latitude.
A writer on Spaceweather says:
“It’s the best I’ve seen here since 2005, with vertical green pillars of light some 60 degrees high accompanied by amazing pulsating motions like the beating of a heart,” he says. “We could even see the beams reflecting on the ocean forming their own glitter paths – what a night!”
Here’s an animation I made of northern lights, about 2004 if my memory serves me.
There are loads of sunspots aimed at Earth, so be alert for other shows like this in the coming nights. The odds are in our favour. And if we continue to be lucky, there won’t be power outages and damaged satellites to go with the show.
The lights have been fantastic here in Yellowknife this winter.
Solar maximum is approaching, so they’ll probably get better even still.
Speaking of science, unless you want to censor this too…
[Removed by Admin: Offtopic trolling]