Aurora Borealis
The Northern Lights

Do you know what causes the Northern Lights?

The video below provides a great explanation for this phenomenon.

The Northern Lights are really just a consequence of crashes between vaporous particles in the Earth’s air with charged particles discharged from the sun. Different color shades are produced when gas particles collide. The most recognized Aurora shading is the pale yellowish-green and happens when oxygen and sun particles collide around 60 miles over the earth. A red aurora is created by high-elevation oxygen and sun partials around 200 miles above the earth; and nitrogen creates blue or purplish-red aurora. This makes for a beautiful phenomenon; and remind us how beautiful nature can be.

General scientific information about Aurora Borealis can be found on NOAA’s website. I located their model below along with an explanation of how Aurora Borealis can be anticipated. I think its very cool.

Explanation on the NOAA website:

”The OVATION Aurora Forecast Model shows the intensity and location of the aurora predicted for the time shown at the top of the map. This probability forecast is based on current solar wind conditions measured at L1, but using a fixed 30-minute delay time between L1 and Earth. A 30-minute delay corresponds to approximately 800 km/s solar wind speed as might be encountered during geomagnetic storming conditions. In reality, delay times vary from less than 30 minutes to an hour or so for average solar wind conditions.”(swpc.noaa.gov, 2016)

—Michele Breedlove