[HN Gopher] Most of Europe is glowing pink under the aurora
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       Most of Europe is glowing pink under the aurora
        
       Author : luispa
       Score  : 1574 points
       Date   : 2024-05-10 21:59 UTC (2 days ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.foto-webcam.eu)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.foto-webcam.eu)
        
       | Kikawala wrote:
       | Even more live views at the main page: https://www.foto-
       | webcam.eu/
        
       | axblount wrote:
       | Is this related to the solar storm? Why is it pink?
        
         | anamexis wrote:
         | Yes, and pink is a typical aurora color.
        
         | NegativeLatency wrote:
         | https://www.space.com/aurora-colors-explained
         | 
         | Oxygen at higher altitudes has a different emission frequency
         | apparently (I've only ever seen the faintest green pulsing
         | aurora IRL)
         | 
         | It's possible to tell what elements something is made of by
         | determining the spectra coming off of it when it's excited:
         | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_spectroscopy
        
       | moralestapia wrote:
       | Oh, boy. So beautiful! It's probably visible where I am as well
       | but there's still some sunlight so gg. Hope it lasts for a while!
        
       | secondcoming wrote:
       | This shows a scientific view of it:
       | 
       | https://earth.nullschool.net/#current/space/surface/level/an...
        
         | NegativeLatency wrote:
         | This is a very cool visulization
        
         | isatty wrote:
         | That's a really cool website. Very responsive too.
        
           | sc__ wrote:
           | I live in a northern Atlantic country and use it to learn
           | about upcoming storms during storm season, days in advance of
           | my national weather service.
        
         | zeteo wrote:
         | Is it visible from Australia as well?
        
         | davidw wrote:
         | Does it shift around? It's quite absent in the western US and
         | Canada right now:
         | 
         | https://earth.nullschool.net/#current/space/surface/level/an...
         | 
         | Of course, it's still a beautiful sunny warm day too where I am
         | so it'll be 5 hours or so before it's dark enough to see it.
        
           | idlewords wrote:
           | The auroral oval stays roughly the same but the Earth rotates
           | under it.
        
             | davidw wrote:
             | Cool! That means if it stays stable, it's headed our way on
             | a very clear evening here. Fingers crossed...
        
         | kzrdude wrote:
         | It was seen in France and Switzerland today, even if they are
         | not colored in on the map, so it could be seen outside the main
         | areas.
         | 
         | Also - there is green over the equator - is that intentional?
        
         | anileated wrote:
         | There is a 50% probability of aurora borealis over the equator
         | right now according to that website.
        
       | bonzini wrote:
       | Barely visible in Northern Italy--no pink worth calling home
       | about--but the sky is sensibly lighter than it usually is.
        
         | davidw wrote:
         | The one pointed 'nordest' from Monte Grappa seems to show some
         | pink:
         | 
         | https://www.meteograppa.it/lewebcam.php
         | 
         | Tried looking for some webcams in the Cortina area but they
         | seem to have a lot of clouds. Some of which appear to have a
         | pink hue.
        
           | bonzini wrote:
           | Light pollution does not help, probably.
        
             | davidw wrote:
             | Found one from the Stelvio pass that shows some colors, but
             | nothing like some of the other links people are posting.
        
         | sarusso wrote:
         | This is from Trieste:
         | https://twitter.com/_sarusso/status/1789112947165270298. Naked
         | eye was way less bright but still well visible I would say!
        
       | davidw wrote:
       | Nice way to celebrate the Giro d'Italia!
        
       | amatecha wrote:
       | Wow! Check out the view from the Jungfraujoch in Switzerland!
       | https://www.jungfrau.ch/en-gb/live/webcams/#webcam-jungfrauj...
        
         | chgs wrote:
         | Doesn't look like that in reality. If I take a photo on my
         | phone here in the UK midlands I get pink and green in all
         | directions with a 3 second exposure.
         | 
         | However with just the naked eye it's like super high level
         | clouds
        
           | mrcus wrote:
           | Yeah, none of these other stories and photos are from reality
        
           | amatecha wrote:
           | Yeah, camera sensors (depending on filtering) are far more
           | sensitive to the dim light of the aurora than our eyes. Still
           | means you can get utterly amazing photography there already!
           | :)
        
             | codetrotter wrote:
             | A couple of years ago in the middle of Norway (not south,
             | not north, in-between) me and a friend saw in the news that
             | there would be aurora borealis, which is not common in that
             | part of Norway.
             | 
             | We were outside at like 2AM in the night that day trying to
             | spot it but could see any hint of it for the life of us.
             | 
             | Finally we used his phone and long exposure to see what it
             | would pick up and on the captured photo we saw shades of
             | green like aurora borealis.
             | 
             | Quite fascinating, it was.
        
               | Filligree wrote:
               | For what it's worth... growing up in Tromso, we have
               | auroras a few dozen times per winter usually.
               | 
               | They were always strong enough to be easily seen, often
               | quite dramatic. It really does look like that if you're
               | far enough north.
        
               | codetrotter wrote:
               | For sure. As mentioned though we were in the middle of
               | Norway, not north.
               | 
               | Well, actually the proper term for where we were at is
               | East Norway. And I guess by official standards the middle
               | of Norway is further north than where I consider the
               | middle of Norway to be.
               | 
               | To be very specific, we were in Gjovik.
        
               | erikbye wrote:
               | Here's a few crappy phone pics from near Oslo on a night
               | (evening, around 19 I think) it was very visible with the
               | naked eye. 0.5 seconds exposure.
               | 
               | https://www.flickr.com/search/?sort=date-taken-
               | desc&safe_sea...
        
               | codetrotter wrote:
               | That's awesome! Wish I get to see it that visible too.
        
               | dotancohen wrote:
               | I was lucky enough to be in Tromso in February 2013
               | during the last solar cycle maximum. It was absolutely
               | amazing, even a local who we happened upon near one of
               | the fjords while he was cross country skiing - in the
               | middle of the night - said that he had never seen such
               | aurora. They were gold and purple along with the more
               | common greens and reds that we had seen all week.
        
             | ShakataGaNai wrote:
             | I was in Northern MN a couple years back when there was
             | some decent aurora https://imgur.com/a/nBjdhZ9
             | 
             | What the camera caught was really impressive! Even with
             | just a couple seconds exposure on a phone. But what the
             | human eye saw was.... effectively a portion of the sky that
             | was unusually bright and seemed to have some sort of
             | movement. Like you stared at it and knew something was
             | amiss, but nothing "impressive" to look at.
        
               | erikbye wrote:
               | Come to the arctic circle during polar night, then you
               | will see impressive.
        
             | porphyra wrote:
             | Human eyes are basically black and white in low light since
             | rod cells can't detect color.
        
           | deadbabe wrote:
           | Ok why is it that some people say northern lights look
           | EXACTLY like these spectacular photos, and others say in real
           | life they are actually barely visible and you need a camera
           | and very dark skies?
           | 
           | Is there some kind of running joke I'm missing? I saw some
           | northern lights in Iceland but they were very dim and
           | underwhelming, I didn't even know what I was looking at until
           | I photographed them and saw the vivid green streaks in the
           | photo, which definitely weren't super visible in real life.
           | The tour guide even said they aren't actually like the photos
           | at all!
           | 
           | Are northern lights bullshit or what? What is possible to see
           | with just a bare naked eye?
        
             | nerdenough wrote:
             | They'll never look exactly like the long exposure, ultra
             | vibrant photos. However, when they are really strong you
             | can see both greens and purples very distinctly with the
             | naked eye.
             | 
             | One experience you can get in person when they're really
             | strong is how fast they can dance around above you as well.
             | I've found the dancing lights to the naked eye are much
             | more astounding than in timelapses or videos, 1) because
             | that's when they're most vibrant in person, and 2) because
             | you can see just how fast and jittery and energetic they
             | are, unlike in a video which is usually captured at much
             | less than 30fps for low light and denoised and frames
             | mashed together to create those soupy smooth videos and
             | timelapses. Nice in their own way, but nowhere near the
             | same experience.
             | 
             | And when they're very low energy they will just look like
             | green grey clouds to the naked eye.
             | 
             | Source: live in the arctic
        
             | Geee wrote:
             | Yeah, typically northern lights look like faint white
             | clouds with a little bit of green tint to naked eye. The
             | photos are like those time-exposure photos of the milky
             | way, which is not what the eye sees.
        
               | matsemann wrote:
               | While they "typically" look like that, because most often
               | they're quite weak, I wouldn't compare it to milky way
               | photos. If it's strong, especially if you're up north and
               | somewhere with little light pollution, what you see is
               | comparable to lots of pictures.
        
               | jnurmine wrote:
               | In addition to the intensity of the Solar activity,
               | location matters, especially nowadays.
               | 
               | The auroras won't be super vivid near larger cities in
               | Central Europe, with a lot of light around you. It's just
               | not north enough and not dark enough. Up north, rural
               | Lapland or so, it can get very vivid during a winter.
               | 
               | Cameras tend to add their extra though.
               | 
               | A surprising thing to me was how the aurora can sometimes
               | be still and sometimes move so fast. It is a strange
               | experience. One would expect something that covers such a
               | large part of the visible sky-dome to move slowly, but
               | instead it can swipe around quite quickly ("like a fox's
               | tail").
        
               | fch42 wrote:
               | If you ever have the chance to see the Milky way from
               | Namibia, the Andes, the Western Australian desert, you
               | may revise your view there. The dust clouds and star
               | streams extend far out and make it appear like "standing
               | on the bridge of as starship". It looks very 3D. Still
               | not colorful, but immersive and so much detail.
               | 
               | Alas, in the northern hemisphere, we've been pretty good
               | eradicating nighttime darkness (and a lot else besides
               | ...).
        
               | marssaxman wrote:
               | In the northern hemisphere, you can enjoy that view -
               | spectacularly - from Mauna Kea. I had never before
               | realized that you could perceive _depth_ in the sky.
        
               | swiftcoder wrote:
               | You should try seeing the milky way from the middle of an
               | ocean sometime - most folks have never been far enough
               | from light pollution to really see it as it used to be.
               | 
               | It really does look like a river of starlight across the
               | sky, once you are a few hundred miles away from shore.
        
             | flak48 wrote:
             | I've seen both.
             | 
             | Last night from London the most I could see with my naked
             | eye was diffuse patches of faint pink and green - sometimes
             | highlighted by marginally brighter white-pink streaks that
             | cut across the patches. The camera however picked them up
             | as dramatic bright pink/green columns of light with rarely
             | any trace of the blackness of the sky.
             | 
             | When I was in Iceland a few years ago though - I distinctly
             | remember being easily able to make out super bright and
             | well define dancing wavy bands of bright green, pink,
             | purple and orange (with high contrast compared to the
             | surrounding dark sky) with my naked eye. The camera again
             | picked up the same thing but with the blackness of the sky
             | covered by a green /pink coloured background - something
             | definitely brighter but less well defined that what I could
             | see with my naked eye (and the camera images were not
             | necessarily superior than what I could see in this case).
             | 
             | TL:DR; I've seen both versions of what you describe with my
             | naked eye and it's definitely not bullshit! When people say
             | they can't see anything like the pictures - I would have to
             | guess that they either have never been in an area with
             | significant activity or maybe didn't have dark enough skies
             | without light pollution.
        
               | majikandy wrote:
               | In my back garden in london initially it felt like maybe
               | I was just seeing remnants of having looked at a
               | lightbulb and then looking at the sky. After a bit of
               | eyes adjusting the pinks were very clear and the white
               | streaks like rays of light you see in those kind of beams
               | from heaven type pictures. The green was more on the
               | horizon and initially needed the camera to show it at
               | all, and then again after a while I could see feint green
               | with the naked eye. Yes the camera showed it more, but
               | the naked eye experience was also magical and I feel very
               | lucky to have seen it on bbc news website by chance
               | before going to bed. I watched it from 11:15pm to
               | midnight when it seemed to vanish as if it was never
               | there in the first place. I feel like I caught the ISS in
               | a photo too but I can't find definitive information it
               | was overhead at 11:51pm uk time, so it probably wasn't.
        
             | dimask wrote:
             | Imo if the northern lights are strong, the live experience
             | is superior to photos because of how they move, while
             | photos are still images. But many times they are not as
             | strong and they do not look like much with naked eye, while
             | long exposure will catch more of it.
        
             | silisili wrote:
             | As someone who has never seem them, what I wish most people
             | would do is attempt to edit said photos to 'about what it
             | looked like to my eyes.'
             | 
             | You can find some online, but they range from 'just like
             | the picture' to 'random fog', so one is left not knowing
             | what to believe.
        
               | bawolff wrote:
               | It varries significantly depending where you are. Both
               | could be true for different people viewing them from
               | different places.
        
               | silisili wrote:
               | These would be interesting data points based on season,
               | location, and weather conditions nonetheless.
        
               | bawolff wrote:
               | That's a little like asking people to report how wet they
               | got when it was raining, and not controlling for if they
               | have an umbrella or were out after the storm passed.
        
               | Nition wrote:
               | I was in a place with fair amount of light pollution, and
               | far from where the aurora would be strongest.
               | 
               | These two photos taken with my camera, are approximately
               | how it looked to my eyes after they'd adjusted to the
               | dark:
               | 
               | https://i.imgur.com/8OOiCgX.png
               | https://i.imgur.com/GCpyumd.png
               | 
               | As a comparison, this is how my phone captured the same
               | scene with default settings:
               | 
               | https://i.imgur.com/FCvN3gf.jpeg
        
               | silisili wrote:
               | Thanks! Certainly two entirely different visuals.
        
               | Nition wrote:
               | Yeah. Although I'm sure you can get closer to the phone
               | photo in real life if you're somewhere very dark and near
               | the poles.
        
             | _ph_ wrote:
             | I saw them yesterday mostly as light grey clouds. But at
             | one moment, those clouds turned slightly red to me. I am at
             | a very bright location and quite far to the south. So I
             | only can assume, that their brightness was at the brink of
             | color vision and that my eye wasn't perfectly adapted to
             | the dark. In better circumstances and perhaps with a tiny
             | bit more "signal", they should appear in colors.
        
             | fch42 wrote:
             | I've seen both impressive (colorful, bright, straight
             | overhead and fast movement) as well as barely noticeable
             | (colorless bands/sheets that "look like faint clouds but
             | somehow odd". With the "odd" mostly meaning that they move
             | different from clouds; not preferentially in wind (or any)
             | direction, and often just around our eye's threshold. It
             | also, sometimes, looks like a band of light pollution low
             | along the northern horizon, when the green main aurora oval
             | is "just" visible.
             | 
             | Few-seconds exposures on a digital camera bring the colors
             | out that you may or may not see by eye if the aurora is
             | weak.
             | 
             | Also, especially mid-latitudes, sometimes an Aurora display
             | has moments of higher brightness with color, and then again
             | "grey curtains".
             | 
             | The most impressive thing about stronger Aurora, to me, is
             | the "fine structure", the fact you may have it well
             | overhead (not just on the northern horizon) and the fast
             | movements. It can look like "beads" running up and down the
             | curtains, or "lances" being thrown from the sky, and
             | line/streak structures are very sharply outlined, not like
             | the soft blur in multi-second pictures. And the curtains
             | can "wave" across the entire sky in a second then.
             | 
             | But I haven't seen enough Aurora to dare predict anything
             | ... I cross my fingers.
        
             | dahart wrote:
             | Not bullshit. When you see a strong one, it looks like all
             | the amazing photos, and better because it's moving and
             | spanning the sky. Photos never capture the scale.
             | 
             | I had a similar thought about the sun's corona during a
             | solar eclipse, for some reason I thought people were using
             | special photo processes to extract something that was hard
             | to see without equipment. Then caught an eclipse and the
             | corona blooms like a huge flower in the sky and it's better
             | than almost all the photos. I'm guessing the dynamic range
             | of the corona makes it very hard to photograph anywhere
             | near as good as what it looks like when you're there.
        
             | Kon5ole wrote:
             | One thing to consider is that when you run outside because
             | you get a tip about northern lights, your eyes need about
             | 20-30 minutes to fully adjust to darkness. If you do things
             | like look at a phone display or camera display while
             | waiting, that "timer" gets reset.
             | 
             | In my experience when the lights are strong (and your eyes
             | have adjusted), they look a lot like the photos - not as
             | saturated color-wise, but very bright.
        
             | marssaxman wrote:
             | I wonder the same. My wife and I drove out to a park east
             | of Seattle late last night to spend a couple hours watching
             | the aurora, and it was... okay. I saw some faint grey
             | wisps, like high-altitude clouds, which occasionally faded
             | away and reappeared elsewhere. A mild novelty, but nothing
             | I would bother to seek out again; I assumed we were too far
             | south, or out of the path, and hadn't gotten to see it
             | properly.
             | 
             | This morning, though, my feeds are chock-a-block with
             | dramatic, colorful, detailed photos, complete with
             | rapturous commentary about the drama of the spectacle,
             | posted by people in the same area who were apparently
             | watching the same sky! Well... that's a different
             | experience than I had. I'd been told that the colors showed
             | up more clearly through a camera, but I hadn't realized
             | there would be little to see without one.
        
               | PuffinBlue wrote:
               | There are many variables. Visual acuity, how well your
               | eyes can adapt to low light, colour sensitivity, light
               | pollution and cloud cover are just a few. Even standing
               | next to each other two people can have different
               | experiences thanks to those variables.
               | 
               | I am very fortunate to have excellent visual acuity, low
               | light sensitivity and am extremely sensitive to
               | colour/different shades or tones. There are test you can
               | do online for this if you have a well calibrated screen.
               | I also used to be a photographer and worked for years in
               | low light settings documenting events. So I have put that
               | good fortune in the genetic lottery to good use!
               | 
               | So for me, I absolutely saw the full colour display very
               | strongly. I could see variations in colour throughout the
               | height of the column and i could easily make out the
               | striations between the different filaments. I could also
               | easily see the curve of the bands across the northern
               | sky. The colours to me were as obvious as the orange of
               | light pollution you might see from a nearby town. I could
               | see the low level patches of cloud silhouetted against
               | the green and the huge bands of red/pinky red towering up
               | into space.
               | 
               | What I will say though is that even looking at my phone
               | was enough to dull the experience. And minimally strong
               | light in the eye instantly desaturated the colours of the
               | aurora and took a minute or two to recover. So you really
               | do need dark places, dark skies and to really let your
               | eyes full adjust to their maximum possible sensitivity.
        
               | BenjiWiebe wrote:
               | So at 9:55PM in central Kansas, you could see definite
               | pink/red in the north (vertical strips, reminiscent of
               | sunset/sunrise through clouds) and a bright
               | colorless/maybe greenish patch straight up. Also some
               | faint pink to the west. The color was unmistakable in the
               | north though and only required a minute or so of dark
               | adaptation after coming out of the house. It's dark skies
               | here but not extremely dark. Funny thing is the aurora
               | itself made the sky very not-dark.
        
             | bitcurious wrote:
             | > Ok why is it that some people say northern lights look
             | EXACTLY like these spectacular photos, and others say in
             | real life they are actually barely visible and you need a
             | camera and very dark skies?
             | 
             | There is a lot of variability in people's night vision. I
             | viewed this past aurora with a friend, we went to a
             | relatively dark sky location and let our eyes adjust for 30
             | minutes. In that setting, I could make out the green and
             | red coloration while she mostly saw it as a while glow.
        
         | dylan604 wrote:
         | Any place with that much snow in mid-May is just make believe
         | to me at this point in time.
        
         | hackernewds wrote:
         | what am I expecting to see?
        
           | rahkiin wrote:
           | These are live webcams. At the time it was sent it was
           | probably showing the aurora
        
       | crdrost wrote:
       | Nice livestream from a bloke on YouTube:
       | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rTxvAQYKGPI
        
       | consp wrote:
       | Most of Europe == Not covered by light polution. (and specific
       | areas)
       | 
       | (it's orange outside and it's sodium vapor related)
       | 
       | edit: kind of whish I was at my parent's place. It's a lot less
       | poluted but no go here; nw europe densly populated, we also have
       | the artificial sunrise here 24/7 by means of greenhouses.
        
         | EA-3167 wrote:
         | Classic aurora move, I can almost hear the charged particles
         | now...
         | 
         | "Und doch habe ich allein, allein auf mich gestellt, ganz
         | Europa erobert!"
         | 
         | Sure you did charged particles, sure you did, but welcome to
         | Europe's secret weapon: Light pollution!
        
           | consp wrote:
           | > Sure you did charged particles
           | 
           | Well technically ... sodium vapor lamps are charged
           | particles. But yea you are correct we're screwed.
        
         | Starlevel004 wrote:
         | Even in the light polluted London you can still see it, even if
         | it's faint.
        
           | consp wrote:
           | From the ground I cannot see it (I'm a bit north of london
           | latitude wise so it should be better), and we have nicely
           | combination of areas of greenhouses and petrochemical
           | companies burning off here so it might be far worse than
           | central london unfortunately. I'm not too high up but my view
           | north is quite ok ... and unnatural orangeish and void of any
           | pink.
        
         | TomWhitwell wrote:
         | It's just about visible (much more so through an iPhone camera)
         | in central London right now
        
           | Reason077 wrote:
           | That's pretty incredible. Central London is so bright at
           | night that very few stars are even visible usually.
        
         | evanb wrote:
         | I could see faint streaks from central Berlin. No doubt it'd
         | look better from a deep darkness but even in the city it can be
         | seen tonight.
        
         | fransje26 wrote:
         | > we also have the artificial sunrise here 24/7 by means of
         | greenhouses.
         | 
         | That's a Dutch thing. You can choose between being a great
         | exporter of unripe, tasteless tomatoes, or seeing Aurora
         | Borealis, but you can't have both..
        
           | clmul wrote:
           | This is what I could see with my camera in the east of the
           | Netherlands, and even with the naked eye I could easily see
           | some red at times: https://imgur.com/a/kloWEOl
        
           | kubanczyk wrote:
           | > a great exporter of unripe, tasteless tomatoes
           | 
           | The small ones are okay-ish (cherry tomatoes) if that makes
           | you happier
        
         | Angostura wrote:
         | Well, I was watching it in East London last night
        
         | bowsamic wrote:
         | I was in middle of nowhere Sweden last week but the number of
         | daylight hours are so high that far north that even in the dead
         | middle of the night the sky is still blue
        
       | _fizz_buzz_ wrote:
       | Saw them in the west of Germany. Phone camera made them more
       | visible. But also clearly visible with the naked eye.
        
         | pixelpoet wrote:
         | Looked outside just now around Bad Homburg in Frankfurt area,
         | nothing :( So depressing
        
       | ChrisArchitect wrote:
       | More discussions on related NOAA posts:
       | 
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40315394
       | 
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40318356
        
       | docapotamus wrote:
       | I live in rural very northern England. It's incredible, clear
       | with the naked eye. iPhone 14 camera with 3s exposure is out of
       | this world (pun intended, but misleading)
        
         | jon_adler wrote:
         | Similar for me down south too (Cambridge). My first sighting
         | and it is superb.
        
         | AlexAndScripts wrote:
         | I'm near Bristol. It's still absolutely stunning. It's not just
         | to the north, either - it's everywhere.
        
           | docapotamus wrote:
           | Yep I noticed that to, it's sort of bathing everywhere from
           | zenith
        
         | matsemann wrote:
         | Yeah, it's often easy to make it look much better on camera
         | than what it did in real life. Something to keep in mind if one
         | feel one missed out, heh.
         | 
         | Also, timelapses of long exposures can give a wrong impression
         | of how it moves. But has for a long time been the only way to
         | actually see a video of it.
         | 
         | It's often not that slow and wavy in real life. It's more like
         | watching an orchestra play, where suddenly someone plays a
         | flute in the corner, and then a few moments later a trombone
         | sounds from the other side. It's dramatic and beautiful when
         | it's really on.
         | 
         | But modern video cameras are now good enough to capture this in
         | real time, so hopefully we'll see more realistic videoes.
        
           | docapotamus wrote:
           | Agree. Was surprised how well the phone pulled the colour
           | out.
           | 
           | Can't find my DSLR unfortunately otherwise it'd be on the
           | tripod.
           | 
           | Had to wake the 6 year old for him to see this, once in a
           | life time type of thing
        
             | schoen wrote:
             | If I understand correctly, I think there's a decent chance
             | to have something similar at any given solar maximum (about
             | every 11 years)
             | 
             | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_maximum
             | 
             | But it's definitely not a sure thing, and this could very
             | well be the biggest one for decades to come.
        
         | penteract wrote:
         | In less rural northern England, it was faintly visible to me.
         | If I hadn't been looking for the aurora specifically, I would
         | have assumed it was a weird cloud. After walking a bit away
         | from street lights I could make out a south facing arc spanning
         | the sky directly overhead which went away within a few minutes.
        
         | mattbee wrote:
         | Since we're all scientists here, I'll report a negative from
         | central York. My wife and I stood up in the attic looking out
         | of the Velux for 10 minutes. It was dark, clear and we were
         | could see from NE-ish to SE-ish. We couldn't really call it. A
         | very subtle effect on a 10s smartphone exposure, mayyybe? I
         | will compare with tonight.
         | 
         | We once rented a beautiful, slightly remote house on a beach
         | outside Reykjavik and one night, the sky danced for us. So I
         | don't feel hard done-by.
        
           | davejohnclark wrote:
           | Interesting, maybe it depends on when you were looking? Also
           | central York and we popped outside just after half eleven and
           | the aurora was very visible to the naked eye, not in full
           | multicolour but very clearly not a cloud, quite thick and
           | radiating out from a centre in the sky almost all the way
           | down to the horizon. We have a reasonably dark place we can
           | look from near us (and where we got some photos on a
           | smartphone camera that show a sky full of vivid purples and
           | greens) but I could see it clearly enough from right outside
           | our house even with the bright led streetlights all around.
           | 
           | After 20 minutes it faded from view almost entirely and we
           | went inside. I have no idea if it came back or what it was
           | like beforehand, maybe we got very lucky or maybe it came and
           | went through the night?
        
             | mattbee wrote:
             | I must have caught a calmer moment at midnight then! I'm in
             | Murton so there's not a lot of light looking away from
             | town.
        
           | danw1979 wrote:
           | I'm 5 miles to the east ! (Dunnington) and was gutted to hear
           | this morning that I'd missed an amazing display here last
           | night. Many people in the village saw the aurora in varied
           | colours - greens, purples, pinks. Incredible photos... it
           | sounds like it was just before midnight that it really kicked
           | off.
        
       | mmastrac wrote:
       | The NOAA forecast suggests it'll be nearly as powerful as the
       | March 13th storm in '89 that took out the Quebec grid:
       | https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/communities/aurora-dashboard-exper...
        
       | idontwantthis wrote:
       | Is there a map of the world showing where it should be visible? I
       | wonder how far I would need to drive.
        
         | nilsherzig wrote:
         | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40324332
        
           | idontwantthis wrote:
           | I can't tell what to make of that. It looks normal northern
           | to me but people are saying it's going to be visible in
           | Alabama tonight.
        
             | doodlebugging wrote:
             | Saw it in N Texas between dark +15minutes and about 2:30
             | this morning. Really nice. I've waited since 2003 to see
             | another from my front yard. I caught the big ones during
             | that last solar max including the X27 flare auroras. This
             | show came from a merging of several X-class flares in quick
             | succession. There was an X5.7 today that may also give us a
             | show in 2-3 days depending on whether it had an earth-
             | directed component.
             | 
             | spaceweather.com spaceweatherlive.com
             | 
             | other links in related posts also have additional sites to
             | track things like this. Good luck.
        
         | _ph_ wrote:
         | Where are you located?
        
           | idontwantthis wrote:
           | SW USA
        
             | _ph_ wrote:
             | It really depends how far south you are and how strong the
             | solar storm will get. You should look for some dark place
             | close up. But it might be, that it is only visible on the
             | northern parts of the US. Even seeing it there is quite
             | uncommon.
        
               | doodlebugging wrote:
               | This one was visible all the way to at lest San Antonio,
               | Texas and the Florida Keys. I won't be surprised to see
               | photos from Mexico. Nice show.
        
       | marmakoide wrote:
       | Wow, I just went outside (South West of France) to plug the car
       | for charging before going to bed.
       | 
       | I noticed unusual, faint light patterns in the night sky, like
       | long spikes coming from the North. It was not the Milky Way, we
       | can see every clear night. Color was mostly gray slightly pink.
       | Wondered what was that ... My first aurora !!!
        
         | mysterydip wrote:
         | > It was not the Milky Way, we can see every clear night.
         | 
         | I'm exceedingly jealous. I don't think I've ever lived
         | somewhere that I could see it, no matter how clear the night.
         | Looking at images of "north america at night" vs "europe at
         | night" I can see why.
        
           | IG_Semmelweiss wrote:
           | In most locations around the world , I think you are a 3 hour
           | drive from a camping trip with milky way nightime exposure.
           | 
           | Try it out! Enlist some of your hiking friends. They'll tell
           | you where to go.
        
           | Avalaxy wrote:
           | With the milky way it's the same thing as the auroras. I went
           | camping in the middle of nowhere USA, and on a clear night
           | you can absolutely not see the milkyway the way it's
           | portrayed in photos. It looks waaaaaaaaay less clear. You
           | need a very long exposure camera to see it the same way as on
           | the internet. The only difference with Europe is that I saw
           | more stars, but none of those nebulas.
        
             | BytesAndGears wrote:
             | Not entirely true, I was out hiking in the mountains of
             | Colorado, and that was the best Milky Way view I've ever
             | seen. It looked just like the crazy photos with millions of
             | stars. Just laid on a rock staring at it for an hour
        
         | amatecha wrote:
         | Go take some photos with your camera -- it will pick up
         | brilliant colours from what looks like super dim/grey
         | "clouds/glow" to our eyes :)
        
       | matsemann wrote:
       | Where do people get their forecasts? I often use this one, but
       | it's not very usable outside Norway. Great if you click into each
       | forecast (click the image) and get more details. Like how it
       | actually covers the sky in that location. So that I can use that
       | to plan (doesn't matter if it's strong if it's in a direction I
       | can't see it) https://site.uit.no/spaceweather/data-and-
       | products/aurora/os...
       | 
       | Used to use a NOAA page, but they changed it a while ago and
       | don't find it as useful anymore.
       | https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/communities/aurora-dashboard-exper...
       | 
       | Some weather services also have a kp index, but I often feel
       | those can't be trusted, and don't tell the whole story. And
       | aurora is quite hit or miss, so need more updated data.
       | 
       | I have an app on my phone (AuroraNotifier) that chimes when
       | there's hope. And then I use these others to plan a bit better.
       | But some more interactive map akin to the uit.no one but where I
       | can place myself around would be nice.
       | 
       | Edit: someone posted this below, looks nice, have some other
       | kinds of data https://www.spaceweatherlive.com/en.html
       | 
       | Edit2:
       | https://earth.nullschool.net/#current/space/surface/level/an...
        
         | jimmygrapes wrote:
         | Generally I wake up and assess which of my body parts are
         | experiencing issues. Pressure differentials play havoc upon
         | internal pockets. Other than that I go outside and feel the
         | temperature and humidity and witness the general movement (or
         | abcence of movement) of cloud formations. I smell the air.
         | Surprisingly, these sensations are pretty close to accurate
         | when it comes to predicting local weather.
         | 
         | I am not sure how to do that for space weather yet.
        
       | NKosmatos wrote:
       | It's currently at Kp8. https://www.spaceweatherlive.com/en.html
        
       | coryfklein wrote:
       | What latitude do we expect to be able to see this in the USA?
        
         | ceejayoz wrote:
         | Possibly as far south as Alabama.
         | https://abcnews.go.com/amp/US/northern-lights-south-alabama-...
        
         | merek wrote:
         | See the Auroral oval map
         | https://www.spaceweatherlive.com/en.html
         | 
         | Right now it's appearing over North East US, and should become
         | increasingly visible after sunset.
        
       | Rwyt wrote:
       | Well visible in central Switzerland:
       | https://feed.yellow.camera/rigi-scheidegg
       | https://feed.yellow.camera/rigi-rotstock
        
         | bsdooby wrote:
         | Crazy, even Bern is bathed in Northern Lights
        
         | MichaelZuo wrote:
         | Just amazing... I've only ever seen these kinds of photos at
         | the north pole before.
        
       | relyks wrote:
       | Are we supposed to be able to see anything in North America?
        
         | kzrdude wrote:
         | In some places yes
         | https://services.swpc.noaa.gov/images/aurora-forecast-northe...
        
           | relyks wrote:
           | Thanks! I have a small chance of seeing something lol
        
           | mcint wrote:
           | Keep in mind, this is only a 30 minute leading forecast. And
           | day-night status has a strong effect on the ionosphere, to
           | the extent that radio stations have different regulated
           | broadcast power day versus night, and amateur radio folks
           | bounce radio off it at night.
        
           | 0xcafecafe wrote:
           | Italy is not shown in the forecast zone but pics are
           | surfacing from northern parts of it. Does that mean there is
           | hope for southern US?
        
             | sseagull wrote:
             | I dunno how far south you mean, but we see it in SW
             | Virginia (which is outside the forecast zones that I've
             | seen).
        
         | idlewords wrote:
         | I'd wait until after sunset.
        
           | relyks wrote:
           | Indeed :)
        
         | r2_pilot wrote:
         | It's even visible in north Mississippi.
        
         | russdill wrote:
         | I saw a very faint red and just a tiny bit of green from a
         | Phoenix/LA flight. 34N
        
       | hnthrowaway0328 wrote:
       | In Quebec and eagerly waiting for the sunset. Ah a few weeks ago
       | the sun was the old lover and now please go away...
        
       | insane_dreamer wrote:
       | Aurora aside, that is a very cool website.
        
       | impish19 wrote:
       | These Barbie promos are getting out of hand
        
       | hippich wrote:
       | If I am in Texas, should I take care of anything? Like flip
       | breakers or disconnect solar panels?
        
         | _ph_ wrote:
         | No, this is all quite harmless.
        
         | billsmithaustin wrote:
         | All of that. Plus, wrap your head in aluminum foil.
        
           | stevenally wrote:
           | Oil the guns. Count the ammo.. .
        
         | idlewords wrote:
         | It never hurts to fire wildly into the air, Yosemite Sam style.
        
         | ta988 wrote:
         | No only an issue with really long lengths of cables. Electrical
         | companies have to mitigate
        
       | mcv wrote:
       | I heard the aurora would be visible in Netherland, so living in
       | Amsterdam I just went outside to check. Nothing. Maybe some very
       | vague lighter bands in some places? Cities have too much light
       | for this sort of thing.
        
         | andrepd wrote:
         | You're in the most light-polluted region of the continent.
         | Unlikely you can see anything I'd wager x)
        
           | grsmvg wrote:
           | I saw visible pink bands from my balcony in Amsterdam,
           | showing bright pink fading to green when looking through my
           | iPhone. And yes, lots of light pollution here. Shows how
           | crazy strong this northern light was.
        
         | willmadden wrote:
         | You have to drive away from the city lights, turn off
         | screens/lights, and let your eyes adjust. Cities are light
         | polluted.
        
       | panzi wrote:
       | Thank you! Just made some (blurry) long exposure photos on an old
       | digital camera. Can't see it with the naked eye here.
        
       | complex_pi wrote:
       | Well visible in Belgium starting around 23:30 ! Even with the
       | naked eye ! (From outside the city)
        
         | DoingIsLearning wrote:
         | Still true now? In the netherlands hard to tell anything.
         | Certainly nothing on the level of the Swiss pictures being
         | shared.
        
           | complex_pi wrote:
           | I stayed up until about 1AM only. Views from the mountains
           | are hard to match in any case 8-)
        
           | clmul wrote:
           | Around 1 AM at night this was the view in the east of the
           | Netherlands: https://imgur.com/a/kloWEOl
           | 
           | With the naked eye I could see moving bright "clouds", and
           | sometimes see streaks of red inside them. After 1:30 it died
           | out quite rapidly for me.
        
       | hyperluz wrote:
       | Is that happening because Earth is loosing its magnetic field and
       | the end is near? ;)
        
         | phyzome wrote:
         | Pretty sure we get aurorae because we _have_ a strong magnetic
         | field...
        
       | alpha_squared wrote:
       | This also appears to be happening in the southern hemisphere as
       | well and growing brighter. My layman understanding is auroras are
       | the result of coronal mass ejections interacting with Earth's
       | atmosphere, but I don't recall these incidents being large enough
       | to be so visible in the northern and southern hemispheres
       | simultaneously.
        
         | bsdooby wrote:
         | Carrington comes to mind...
        
           | idlewords wrote:
           | That had aurora visible in Florida and Hawaii. It's going to
           | take a little more effort from the Sun to match that.
        
             | willmadden wrote:
             | Not for long. The earth's magnetic field is decaying at an
             | exponential rate as the poles shift.
             | 
             | I believe we've spent far too much time worrying about CO2
             | and not nearly enough worrying about the dangers from our
             | sun.
        
               | twojacobtwo wrote:
               | > The earth's magnetic field is decaying at an
               | exponential rate as the poles shift.
               | 
               | Got any scientific sources for that claim?
               | 
               | > I believe we've spent far too much time worrying about
               | CO2 and not nearly enough worrying about the dangers from
               | our sun.
               | 
               | Other than hardening our power grid to the effects of
               | solar storms, what exactly could we do WRT the sun and
               | the magnetic field?
               | 
               | Also, given our serious lack of progress on climate
               | change targets and the glacial pace (pun intended) at
               | which it has been accepted as 1) real and 2)
               | anthropogenic, I think saying 'too much time' is
               | inaccurate.
        
               | vixen99 wrote:
               | I wonder what you (or any of us) would like to say to N.
               | J. Ayuk, Executive Chairman at the African Energy
               | Chamber:- (his words, not mine)
               | 
               | "Africans don't hate Oil and Gas companies. We love Oil
               | and today we love gas even more because we know gas will
               | give us a chance to industrialize. No country has ever
               | been developed by fancy wind and green hydrogen. Africans
               | see Oil and Gas as a path to success and a solution to
               | their problems. The demonization of oil and gas companies
               | will not work."
               | 
               | and this is very far from an isolated opinion in the
               | developing world. Given the amount of Western human
               | capital applied to reducing dependence on fossil fuel
               | it's a somewhat sobering experience to take a look at the
               | Mauna Loa CO2 rate of increase. Can you see any
               | significant decrease in recent years. I can't.
               | 
               | https://gml.noaa.gov/ccgg/trends/
        
               | willmadden wrote:
               | 1) go to perplexity.ai
               | 
               | 2) type in "Is the earth's magnetic field weakening?"
               | 
               | 3) read the summary and click the sources if you don't
               | believe it.
               | 
               | Read this about your CO2. The CO2 in our atmosphere is
               | already at a concentration where the narrow band of
               | wavelengths CO2 absorbs is fully saturated. This means
               | more CO2 isn't going to cause more warming, because there
               | is no more light in its opaque wavelengths to absorb.
               | Also the pattern of CO2 concentration in the atmosphere
               | vs surface temperature does not indicated that CO2 causes
               | warming, but that CO2 levels rise after warming has
               | already occurred. Policy around CO2 is hindering human
               | progress and has caused massive economic damage. The
               | models were all wrong, and this paper explains the
               | reason.
               | 
               | https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S266649
               | 682...
        
             | pyuser583 wrote:
             | Current storm is visible in Florida and Southern Texas, per
             | NOAA.
        
               | vundercind wrote:
               | Like, _visible_ visible? I'm a lot farther north than
               | that and if I hadn't known there was something going on,
               | I'd not have noticed it. It _kinda_ shows up on camera,
               | but naked eye viewing is not even worth a walk to the
               | nearest window. Nothing to see, really.
        
               | Scoundreller wrote:
               | I'm also guessing light pollution was less of a thing in
               | 1859
        
               | idlewords wrote:
               | Having your eyes dark-adapted (even a bit) makes a big
               | difference. Here (Maine) I couldn't see anything out the
               | window, or much of anything stepping outside, but after
               | two minutes could see large-scale aurora across the
               | entire sky, despite being near a bunch of streetlights
               | and passing cars.
        
         | notfish wrote:
         | This is the biggest storm since 2003! We hit a G5 on the SWPC
         | geomagnetic storm reading, and my team had to power down
         | components on our satellites to keep them safe!
        
           | dgellow wrote:
           | Now that's a badass sentence. What is your team working on?
        
             | kortilla wrote:
             | Based on the about: "Code monkey at the elongated muskrat's
             | not-earth corporation"
             | 
             | Starlink
        
               | throwaway290 wrote:
               | Based on lack of response, starshield or some other
               | defense or spy sats
        
           | madaxe_again wrote:
           | While I was happily posting photos of the ionic chaos over
           | your network throughout. Nice one.
        
       | qwertox wrote:
       | Here are some visual tools NASA provides:
       | https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/
        
         | qclibre22 wrote:
         | Typo, that's NOAA, not NASA.
        
       | yodsanklai wrote:
       | Any chance it'll be there tomorrow too?
       | 
       | Seems beautiful in the French alps, wonder if it's worth trying
       | to go there tomorrow
       | 
       | https://www.skaping.com/chamrousse/la-croix?archives=MTcxNTM...
        
         | mcint wrote:
         | There were some follow on flare events. "Additional activity
         | expected"
         | 
         | https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/news/g5-conditions-observed today
         | 
         | https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/homepage in the future
        
           | swader999 wrote:
           | Yep X5.8 registered about an hour ago.
        
       | mhandley wrote:
       | First time I've ever seen the aurora from West London - I always
       | assumed the light polution would make it impossible to see, but
       | here's a picture I took of it over the Thames:
       | https://twitter.com/MarkJHandley/status/1789070802459000892
        
       | s-xyz wrote:
       | This is so freaking cool
        
       | saalweachter wrote:
       | What's the lowest latitude it's being seen from in Europe?
        
         | nraynaud wrote:
         | I don't see it from Grenoble
        
         | pcardoso wrote:
         | Seems to be visible in Portugal, sadly where I live the sky is
         | overcast.
        
         | Dibby053 wrote:
         | These were apparently taken from Calar Alto, Almeria
         | (37deg13'25''N 2deg32'46''W)
         | 
         | https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GNQEcVZX0AA13FE?format=jpg&name=...
         | 
         | https://img2.rtve.es/im/16098919/?w=900
        
         | throwaway11460 wrote:
         | Friends saw it on Canary Islands.
        
       | aeonik wrote:
       | Could a G4 to G5 storm disrupt air planes while in flight?
       | 
       | Do they ever cancel air travel for this level of storm?
        
         | swader999 wrote:
         | Yes, if it's a Boeing plane.
        
           | 77pt77 wrote:
           | Regular atmosphere is enough for that...
        
         | ta988 wrote:
         | No and it is beautiful when you are flying north routes at
         | night.
        
       | grafelic wrote:
       | I feel I need to report my experience from Denmark, Jutland.
       | 
       | It started with white broad streaks, which most of all looked
       | like fog, but then perhaps after 10 minutes or so, we saw colors
       | of red, purple and green begin to emerge from the these streaks.
       | Most astoundingly it all seemed to emanate from a fluctuating
       | point in the middle of the sky. If you looked closely at this
       | point you could see it fall into itself, morphing and shifting
       | continuously.
       | 
       | We went around the house and we could purple streaks at the top
       | and orange to red patches at the bottom of the sky.
       | 
       | Colors observed: Whitish blue, Green, Purple, Red, and Orange
       | 
       | An absolutely a beautiful experience.
        
         | niutech wrote:
         | Can you share a photo?
        
           | grafelic wrote:
           | I took one semi successful photo using my crappy beat-down
           | a20e Samsung phone.
           | 
           | It doesn't do what we saw justice at all.
           | 
           | https://imgur.com/5mlD22W
        
             | frfl wrote:
             | grafelic's image looks totally black on my crappy laptop
             | monitor unless I turn brightness up to 100%, even then it's
             | barely noticeable.
             | 
             | Here's a color enhanced version of grafelic's photo that
             | shows the color bands more easily,
             | 
             | https://i.imgur.com/IS8JWD8.jpeg
             | 
             | Added some blur after color adjustments to remove
             | pixelation artifacts.
        
               | bozhark wrote:
               | I'm b mobile, it's still black with a lil highlight.
               | 
               | Near, but definitely not retrospective
        
             | gareth_untether wrote:
             | When I took photos of the northern lights on my Sony RX1
             | the colours became much stronger. I assumed all digital
             | cameras captured the colours better than our eyes.
        
               | dylan604 wrote:
               | Yes, an electronic sensor is much more sensitive than our
               | eyes. However, even within digital sensors, some are more
               | sensitive than others. Add that sensitivity with the
               | ability to do long exposure, and you can capture things
               | we will _never_ see with our naked eyes. Even with
               | binoculars or telescopes, our eyes will just seem more
               | photons, but pretty much without the color. That 's where
               | the digital sensors really "shine"
        
               | erikbye wrote:
               | Our eyes definitely do not see "pretty much without the
               | color". Born and raised in Norway I've watched more
               | aurora borealis than I care to count. On many occassions
               | you could see all kinds of colors and dancing lights with
               | the naked eye, very strong and vivid, too. Important to
               | be in a dark environment without light pollution. At the
               | arctic circle during polar night you will see northern
               | lights that almost match the most stunning photos you
               | have seen.
        
             | grafelic wrote:
             | Here are some quality photos from Denmark:
             | https://www.dr.dk/nyheder/vejret/saa-vildt-ser-det-ud-se-
             | nat...
        
               | bavell wrote:
               | Incredible!
        
           | joshvm wrote:
           | Currently pretty good at the South Pole. The pink skies are
           | wild. Green auroras are fairlty common over the winter, but
           | it's unusual for it to be this red.
           | 
           | If you're interested in a real time video, here's one I
           | captured a few weeks ago from our "back yard" (excuse the
           | Instagram link)
           | 
           | https://www.instagram.com/reel/C6T27pEO7dQ/?igsh=eXJyOGtuY2l.
           | ..
        
             | joshvm wrote:
             | Here are some additional photos from the current storm - ht
             | tps://www.instagram.com/p/C60Y-gIu4Ob/?igsh=N3AwaGZzODN3eD.
             | ..
             | 
             | Sadly we have pretty high winds at the moment and
             | visibility is poor due to all the blowing snow, but if
             | you're high up (eg an observation deck), it's a bit
             | clearer.
        
             | cinntaile wrote:
             | Unrelated but why are you at the South Pole?
        
               | taneq wrote:
               | Why aren't you?! :P
        
               | ta1243 wrote:
               | All the cool people are there
        
               | GTP wrote:
               | Cool as in cold? :D
        
               | joshvm wrote:
               | I'm wintering for the South Pole Telescope.
               | 
               | https://pole.uchicago.edu/
        
             | robk wrote:
             | Amazing thanks for sharing
        
         | sebastianconcpt wrote:
         | Thank you for sharing that. I wonder at what speed the morphing
         | happen, also a sense of proportion. Very hard to capture that
         | in anything but direct experience.
        
           | nine_k wrote:
           | Per Wikipedia, most auroras are 300 to 600 km wide, and occur
           | at 90 to 150 km above surface. It' below LEO (300 km), but
           | it's considered outer space already. You actually see a thing
           | the size of a mountain range shining and morphing above you
           | in space.
        
           | playingalong wrote:
           | Not sure here in proper continental Europe, but the usual
           | sightings in the Arctic Circle are typically very short. Like
           | it shows up for a minute or even not so. Then you wait an
           | hour and another sighting for tens of seconds. Obviously
           | sometimes it lasts for hours, but this is nothing frequent
           | (in given location).
        
             | sllabres wrote:
             | I am looking at the foto webcam images too and haven't seen
             | the aurora myself, but the photos show a much longer
             | timespan: For Wildhaus the first image with a pink/greenish
             | glow is at 22:22
             | 
             | https://www.foto-webcam.eu/webcam/wildhaus/2024/05/10/2220
             | 
             | and this continues through the entire night
             | https://www.foto-webcam.eu/webcam/wildhaus/2024/05/10/2230
             | 
             | till shortly before sunset, where the exposure time
             | probably shortens too much to capture the color of the the
             | aurora https://www.foto-
             | webcam.eu/webcam/wildhaus/2024/05/11/0420
             | 
             | Other locations:
             | 
             | https://www.foto-webcam.eu/webcam/ewa/2024/05/11/0330
             | 
             | https://www.foto-
             | webcam.eu/webcam/glecksteinhuette/2024/05/1...
             | 
             | https://www.foto-
             | webcam.eu/webcam/hochleckenhaus/2024/05/11/...
        
           | kzrdude wrote:
           | Thee scale is what the pictures don't capture. The color is
           | stronger in the camera but at some point there was a red or
           | pink streak across half the sky. From zenith and down 1/2 way
           | on one side and 2/3 on the other side. As usual, it's hard
           | for a camera to capture the feeling of being there and having
           | it all above you.
           | 
           | The scale of change I saw yesterday is that it fades in or
           | changes over five seconds maybe, it's not changing faster
           | than that. The most intense lights were over some 20 minute
           | period maybe and then slowly it was mostly disappearing
           | again.
        
         | lwansbrough wrote:
         | Someone shared something similar on Twitter:
         | https://x.com/packyM/status/1789113052723314918
        
           | beretguy wrote:
           | Can somebody link not to Twitter, please?
        
           | mk89 wrote:
           | Wow that's magnificent.
        
         | madaxe_again wrote:
         | I'm a few thousand kilometres south of you in Portugal - here,
         | we got the side view of what was above you, and it was
         | spectacular - pink sky underlit by blue and green filled with
         | vast columns. It really gave me the sense of being a tiny thing
         | on a virtually naked sphere hurtling through the void - seeing
         | such titanic structures really puts things into scale.
        
         | irthomasthomas wrote:
         | I was out flying a camera drone on the river Dee between
         | Liverpool and North Wales filming the sunset, when I started
         | getting magnetic interference warnings. At the same time, I
         | started to see flashes in the sky. Then my vision was filled
         | with sparkling lights. A few minutes later I got an aurora
         | warning from my brother and the aurora app. KP 8-9
         | 
         | As the sun went down I was waking through a woodland. I thought
         | the dark would help my eyes to see the aurora, and I could
         | point my camera away from the light pollution of Liverpool and
         | maybe catch some colour with a long exposure.
         | 
         | Suddenly, I realised the colour of the aurora was coming
         | through the trees, and getting brighter. I wasn't expecting it
         | to be visible to naked eye like this. In these latitudes the
         | advice is to set your camera to highest iso and slowest shutter
         | speed and hope to catch a little colour. I wasn't expecting
         | this! So I packed up quick and ran through the woods and into
         | open fields. There, directly above me was this intense white
         | light, with white arms forming a sort-of cross. The longest arm
         | formed an arch over the whole sky, and where they reached the
         | earth, on either side they became colourful, like a twinkling
         | rainbow stretching out to space.
         | 
         | I didn't have the equipment or the wits to get a good photo. I
         | just threw myself on the ground and lay on my back watching.
         | 
         | Wildest thing I ever saw. Absolutely awesome.
         | 
         | When I regain my composure, I will upload some photos somewhere
         | (where, though?) and edit this comment.
        
           | 3np wrote:
           | > and edit this comment.
           | 
           | You have like 30min to edit and there's a timeout for replies
           | too so maybe put the link in your profile if it gets later <3
        
           | fransje26 wrote:
           | Which app have you been using for the aurora warning?
        
             | jfk13 wrote:
             | Not who you were replying to, but I've had the AuroraWatch
             | UK app installed for a while now (and yes, we enjoyed last
             | night's display, after being alerted by the app).
        
           | Moru wrote:
           | You did the right thing, the correct way is to just enjoy it
           | with your eyes. There are enough photos and timelapses on the
           | net anyway. They can't capture the speed of the real thing
           | since you need pretty long exposure time to get enough light.
        
           | dom96 wrote:
           | I was in the area too. Decided to go for a drive to Southport
           | beach to try and catch it and saw.. nothing.
           | 
           | Yesterday evening I tried Crosby beach. Also nothing.
           | 
           | Did I just go at the wrong time? It was between 11pm and 1am.
        
         | b33j0r wrote:
         | Poetry comes to us when we can't say exactly how it made us
         | feel. As a son of Jurgen, I appreciated your account.
        
       | gmuslera wrote:
       | Those are close to the places in Europe where they are growing
       | triffids?
        
       | DonaldFisk wrote:
       | Scotland, 56 degrees north. I expected to see the aurora near the
       | northern horizon, but it was visible east, west and even south,
       | from 11:00pm (2200hrs UTC) until 12:15am (2315UTC). Easily
       | visible to the naked eye. Took good photos on 1 second exposures,
       | ISO 2500.
        
         | manx wrote:
         | Do you mind sharing a photo?
        
       | gizajob wrote:
       | iPhone 14 from my back yard in (extremely light polluted)
       | Liverpool, England.
       | 
       | https://photos.app.goo.gl/KPUMabcnNG6E5gZ77
        
       | lsllc wrote:
       | Anyone have any DSLR settings recommendations? (newbie here,
       | Canon EOS R5).
       | 
       | Located North Eastern US, just about approaching dusk. Fingers
       | crossed!
        
         | eloisius wrote:
         | Crank your ISO up and play with shutter speed. You need a
         | tripod to capture anything satisfactory.
        
         | esmein wrote:
         | Don't be afraid of Iso, you might want manual focus, mirrorless
         | cameras even as good as the R5 have a hard time focusing on
         | "nothing at infinity". Largest aperture your lens can do
         | (biggest hole, smallest f number) and the recommended shutter
         | speeds.
         | 
         | I had luck with iso 3200, f1.4 and 1/6s shutter handheld on a
         | sony a7iv with a 35mm f1.4 GM.
        
           | lsllc wrote:
           | Thanks! Now I just need some cosmic rays to light the sky!
        
         | knolan wrote:
         | Tripod. Long exposure and keep ISO lowish. You may need to
         | manually focus as there won't be a clear object to focus on.
         | 
         | Shoot RAW and you can tweak the image better to pull down the
         | brightness of the sky to help the colours stand out.
        
         | dddrh wrote:
         | Use a tripod and use a remote or set a 2 second delay on your
         | shutter press if you start using longer exposures at low iso
         | (anything longer than 1/10 of a second IMO)
         | 
         | Settings really depend on the effect you are trying to capture:
         | - if you want to try and capture it like your eye sees it: high
         | iso (as high as you can stand) and aim for between 1/500 and
         | 1/30. - if you want to capture a more painterly look with the
         | whole sky colored in: low iso (I'd start at 200) and long
         | exposure >3 seconds. Probably between 3 and 30 seconds
         | depending on the available light.
         | 
         | Those should get you started to experiment and find what you
         | like. Enjoy!
         | 
         | Oh yea. Turn off the focus light, turn off the screen, and turn
         | off the red blinking indicators. Turn all the lights off so you
         | can preserve your night vision.
        
           | lsllc wrote:
           | Thanks, I got some good pictures! AF is def. a problem ...
        
       | nico wrote:
       | This is related to the cycles of Earth's core
       | 
       | Our planet's magnetic field is "entangled" with the Sun's
       | activity
       | 
       | This unusual flare means unusual activity for our magnetic field,
       | hence for the core as well
       | 
       | It would be cool to have some realtime comparison/visualization
       | of Earths magnetic core activity, vs solar flares
        
         | robxorb wrote:
         | Could you provide sources for this? Sounds plausible, given it
         | is electromagnetic energy.
        
           | nico wrote:
           | Just speculating
           | 
           | It's known that the magnetic core is generating/sustaining
           | the magnetic field, which means that anything that happens to
           | the field, has some sort of counterpart in the core
           | 
           | So it would be cool to have that data: what happens inside
           | Earth's core when a big magnetic event is affecting it's
           | magnetic field
        
       | bamboozled wrote:
       | The earth is the greatest spaceship we'll ever know. Complete
       | magic is this phenomenon.
       | 
       | Feels like one is engulfed in the Aurora when it's strong. First
       | time I experienced it the arctic circle actually scared me.
        
         | will1am wrote:
         | It's really damn beautiful, but it's scary. Whenever there are
         | events on Earth that aren't typical of nature at regular times
         | for some reason I always think it's not a good sign..
        
           | throwaway11460 wrote:
           | Don't worry, it's very typical. Just the timescales are
           | literally astronomical.
        
       | pelagicAustral wrote:
       | I'm in the southern hemisphere (near Antarctica) and the sight is
       | absolutely insane, almost terrifying... its a bright red aurora.
       | Never seen anything like it.
        
         | tracyhenry wrote:
         | please post a photo!
        
           | pelagicAustral wrote:
           | I was out last night, but here you go: https://ibb.co/68hPjRT
        
             | jiehong wrote:
             | That's deep red! Quite a different sight!
        
             | tracyhenry wrote:
             | Thank you, this looks amazing
        
         | proxyon wrote:
         | people live near antartica?
        
           | marmakoide wrote:
           | Ushaiha and the Falklands?
        
         | vitorgrs wrote:
         | Even in Uruguay it can be seen... Incredible.
        
       | jeffmess wrote:
       | I can see brown I can see blue I can see violet sky...
        
       | retrac wrote:
       | If you want the best possible view with the naked eye, give them
       | a chance to adapt to the dark properly. The human eye is about
       | 100,000 more sensitive after an hour in total darkness. A
       | smartphone screen or car headlight is enough to undo it.
        
         | kragen wrote:
         | car headlights are brighter than the sun from a short enough
         | distance; perhaps you think we can guess what distance you're
         | talking about seeing the car headline from, but actually you
         | have to be explicit about it
        
           | throwaway_ab wrote:
           | In the dark notice how much light comes from a phone and how
           | much that illuminates the person holding the phone.
           | 
           | A car headlight shining your way from hundreds of meters even
           | over 1km will often illuminate that person far more than
           | their phone screen.
           | 
           | So if the phone screen is enough to undo the hour long eyes
           | adjusting to the dark duration, then the car headlights at
           | almost any realistic distance causes an undo.
        
             | kragen wrote:
             | a headlight a kilometer away may be spread over 36000
             | square meters including your face. (more detailed info on
             | headlight antenna gain would be appreciated.) a 1200-lumen
             | high beam over that area is 0.03 lux
             | 
             | a 500 nit phone screen emitting over about a steradian from
             | an 80mm x 160mm area is 6.4 lumens, but at night you
             | usually turn it down to minimum brightness, say 0.6 lumens.
             | (i haven't measured.) at a distance of 300mm that steradian
             | is 0.09m2, so it's about 6 lux
             | 
             | so the cellphone is about 200 times brighter than the
             | headlight at that distance, and that's also observable from
             | looking at people using cellphones walking on the highway
             | 
             | but the person i was asking for more detail didn't specify
             | that the headlight is pointed at your face; and in most
             | situations where you can see headlights, they're not
             | pointed at you. that's just a detail you filled in
        
         | lambdasquirrel wrote:
         | Makes sense.. all the serious astronomy apps are in black and
         | red, and back before we had phones, we used to use red
         | flashlights if we needed to consult our charts.
        
           | dylan604 wrote:
           | just like all of the 80s military action films with red
           | filtered flashlights or CNC rooms on ships. sometimes, meme
           | like content isn't just made up. as an amateur (at best)
           | astro type person, you learn very quickly how true how
           | quickly a brief flash of white light can ruin your night
           | vision. walking around during the day without sun glasses can
           | also extend the amount of time it takes your eyes to
           | acclimate to the dark. however, once you do allow your eyes
           | to acclimate to the dark, it is amazing to me still how much
           | we can actually see.
        
             | solarwindy wrote:
             | Last night in particular, hiking through the forest there
             | was no need for a flashlight at all.
        
               | dylan604 wrote:
               | On full moons, you can read a book and see the shadows
               | cast by the moonlight. It's fun to take someone to see it
               | for the first time who originally do not believe the
               | shadows are possible.
        
         | punnerud wrote:
         | Use the old pirate trick and keep an eye patch over one of the
         | eyes, and switch when going outside. They used it to be able to
         | see inside the boat going from bright sunlight.
        
           | noman-land wrote:
           | This is genius.
        
           | olive247 wrote:
           | Wait no way? That's where the pirate eye patch trope comes
           | from? There was a practical reason?
        
             | xanderlewis wrote:
             | I had assumed it was because, being a pirate, you were more
             | likely to have had one of your eyes poked out during some
             | sort of melee.
             | 
             | But that's much more interesting...
        
               | scientism wrote:
               | I've read another theory: It's because of the sun damage
               | to their eye from using a sextant for navigation. Haven't
               | been able to confirm it though.
        
               | samus wrote:
               | Such damage is creeping and the brain can just
               | hallucinate the blank patches in the vision away, until
               | only like 10% of the retina is left and it just doesn't
               | work anymore. These days, dumbass laserheads are the most
               | likely to suffer from that problem.
               | 
               | It's amazing how much of our conscious experience is
               | hallucination, and yet a lot of people are disparaging
               | LLMs for doing just the same...
        
               | crashmat wrote:
               | probably because when humans pay full attention and think
               | clearly they can not hallucinate for 99% of things they
               | can sense (disregarfing optical illusion), but there is
               | no 'pay attention and dont hallucinate' switch for LLMs.
        
               | samus wrote:
               | People are bullshitting just the same about topics they
               | know nothing about. They often also won't shut about when
               | others tell them and even when they themselves know that
               | they know nothing. To some extent this is necessary for
               | humans to function at all, and the scientific process
               | starts out from uneducated guesses and rigorously refines
               | them and casts away what doesn't hold up to empiric data.
               | 
               | Optical illusions are evidence of the pile of hacks that
               | our senses and our consciousness use to make sense of the
               | world. I think it is really difficult to fully disengage
               | from the biases this induces, and we are sadly best at
               | perceiving such flaws in others. This might be one of the
               | reasons why humans have to socialize with other humans to
               | maintain mental health.
        
               | 4hg4ufxhy wrote:
               | This would explain why only pirates wear them rather than
               | also ordinary seamen.
        
             | Jare wrote:
             | There's no evidence that this use was real. Mythbusters
             | tried it and said the trick itself does work (which any of
             | has may already know), but who knows if it was even
             | practical in a pirate boat, vs the loss of stereo vision
             | etc.
             | 
             | The whole idea of pirates wearing eyepatches seems simply
             | the replication of one particularly colorful pirate
             | archetype over centuries of literature and tales.
        
               | swiftcoder wrote:
               | I feel like the advantages of stereo vision may be
               | oversold in this scenario. At the distances that sailing
               | vessels would engage there's limited need for binocular
               | depth cues - they really only start to come into play at
               | the point where you would begin a boarding action
        
               | Jare wrote:
               | But the idea of the patches-for-night-vision is precisely
               | to have one eye covered during the boarding, so when you
               | enter the insides of the enemy boat that eye is ready for
               | seeing in the dark.
        
               | lukan wrote:
               | Have you ever tried to climb a rope ladder on a moving
               | ship?
               | 
               | Stereo vision is helpful on ships (and allmost everywhere
               | else where you need eyes), even when not boarding.
        
               | asicsarecool wrote:
               | I don't have binocular vision. I lived aboard a sailboat
               | for a few years. I'm quite active with rock climbing etc
               | and I honestly don't think I would be able to do anything
               | better if I had binocular vision...
               | 
               | Just a thought
        
               | lukan wrote:
               | Good for you!
               | 
               | But I know I am worse doing climbing etc. with one eye.
               | 
               | It is probably something you can train and get used to,
               | that it is not such a big deal, but I cannot imagine
               | doing it on the same level one eyed.
        
               | unkulunkulu wrote:
               | But then again, you did not have enough motivation to
               | spend time learning it. A pirate captain might have
               | enough to actually train this way.
        
         | mypalmike wrote:
         | Yup. Here in the city of Seattle, I went to a park where there
         | were lots of people and unfortunately, lots of light. I could
         | see some wispy light in the sky, and it was interesting to look
         | at but not very dynamic.
         | 
         | After I got home, I just laid down in the grass in the back
         | yard where it's fairly dark. After about 15 minutes, I had a
         | pretty good view of what looked a bit like streaky clouds
         | throughout the sky. It was still somewhat faint but the
         | movement was fantastic to watch.
        
       | petarb wrote:
       | I missed the news around this. Can someone share why this is
       | happening? I thought this was only visible more north and usually
       | green. Thanks!
        
         | pizza wrote:
         | Largest solar storm in 20 years
        
       | DeepYogurt wrote:
       | How long ahead of time can one forecast these events?
        
         | superkuh wrote:
         | Realistically only about half an hour. There are instruments at
         | the L1 lagrange point that can measure the properties of the
         | solar wind and/or CME as they pass and allowed real informed
         | responses to events.
         | 
         | There are also very, very simplified CME propagation models
         | (WSA-ENLIL, etc) that can start with some assumptions and give
         | a reasonable idea about when the CME will arrive within ~12
         | hours.
         | 
         | But for every time the simulations succesfully predict severe
         | geomagnetic events or the like they give false positives a
         | couple dozen times. The simulations cannot predict the
         | geoeffectiveness.
        
       | nomilk wrote:
       | Anyone know of sources/sites that track the magnitude of
       | geomagnetic storms as a time series? (interested to gauge the
       | magnitude of recent ones relative to those of the past, similarly
       | to how we may do so for earthquakes)
        
         | gaudystead wrote:
         | Perhaps not quite what you're looking for, but this might give
         | you a start:
         | 
         | https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_solar_storms
        
         | jeffhuys wrote:
         | https://spaceweathernews.com/
        
       | sarusso wrote:
       | Visible in North Italy as well. Unexpected!
        
         | sarusso wrote:
         | Pic here:
         | https://twitter.com/_sarusso/status/1789112947165270298
        
       | LelouBil wrote:
       | I'm near paris and don't see anything :(
        
       | blululu wrote:
       | This is so cool. I just made a Timelapse from the images of the
       | linked camera: https://youtu.be/pgexFsYzRYE
        
       | ninkendo wrote:
       | Checking in from Detroit here... the aurora is actually super
       | visible on the iPhone camera. Much more than from the naked eye
       | (although they are slightly visible... I have a lot of light
       | pollution around me though.)
       | 
       | I'm curious what causes it to come in better in my iPhones
       | sensors... different wavelengths perhaps?
        
         | ipqk wrote:
         | longer exposure times.
        
           | ninkendo wrote:
           | The longer exposure doesn't seem to affect other aspects of
           | the night sky though, I can see stars way better with the
           | naked eye than my phone will show. That's probably just
           | because of stars being point sources and hard for the camera
           | to focus on in an otherwise black night sky.
        
             | exitb wrote:
             | Another factor is color - our eyes don't notice it well in
             | low light, so the patches don't stand out. Camera sensor is
             | equally sensitive to colors at all brightness levels.
        
       | cozzyd wrote:
       | Just saw it in downtown Chicago (by the lake). Faint, but visible
       | with naked eye. Easier to capture with my pixel 8 than with my
       | (handheld) DSLR, even with a fast lens...kicking myself for not
       | grabbing my tripod
        
         | chicagojoe wrote:
         | Fellow Chicagoan here! I went down one of the piers and saw it
         | as well. At first it looked like cirrus clouds but the colors
         | emerged as my eyes acclimated. I thought it was my brain
         | hallucinating the details it expected but my phone validated
         | what I was seeing. Truly stunning even with just a 2sec
         | exposure.
        
       | dgellow wrote:
       | Damn, I missed it
        
         | aio2 wrote:
         | lmao same
        
         | sph wrote:
         | The only day in years that I decide to go to bed earlier than
         | usual, this happens...
        
       | sva_ wrote:
       | I just came home, went up the mountains. Absolutely crazy what I
       | was able to see. I live somewhere mid to north Germany. Super
       | stoked to go further up north based on what I saw in the sky. I
       | have to say the images don't even nearly do justice to what I saw
       | tonight, it was absolutely amazing. I spent some 6 hours up
       | there. Just poor phone images, sorry.
       | 
       | https://imgur.com/a/lPI9EXc
        
         | dylan604 wrote:
         | from sheer curiosity, I had to try to see what was in that
         | image. just a meager push of the exposure revealed some color
         | on top of the horrid compression:
         | 
         | https://imgur.com/a/D7MGjoS
        
       | rl3 wrote:
       | It's dawn now, did anyone happen to screenshot that page during
       | the night?
       | 
       | The mosaic of pink/purple skies was rather beautiful, but I'm
       | afraid preserving it slipped my mind.
        
         | Geee wrote:
         | I just found out that if you select a webcam you can actually
         | go back in time, or even do a 'backwards timelapse' from the
         | view menu. There's also a 'best of' which seems to have a
         | collection of quite nice shots from all webcams:
         | https://www.foto-webcam.eu/webcam/bestof/
        
           | rl3 wrote:
           | Awesome, thank you!
        
       | roschdal wrote:
       | It's the apocalypse.
        
       | TylerE wrote:
       | Can't see it from where I am in North Carolina as it's sadly
       | overcast, but I'm sseeing photos from friends as far south as
       | Georgia and Alabama of vivid pink auroras.
        
       | squarefoot wrote:
       | Any Ham Radio operators here can share their experience if and
       | how much it affected radio communications?
        
         | tarxvf wrote:
         | I heard CW on 144.2MHz with auroral flutter meaning (if I
         | understand correctly) it propagated through or off the aurora.
         | 
         | So that's cool!
        
       | sagischwarz wrote:
       | Here are some phone pics from my home village in Germany:
       | https://www.nowhereinparticular.xyz/polarlichter.html
       | 
       | This was a once-in-a-lifetime experience. My brother, who is a
       | hobby astronomer, called me and sent me outside. Initially, I saw
       | only a faint red glow in the northeast of the sky, but after a
       | few minutes, my eyes adapted and I could see how it slowly moved
       | and changed its form over time. I stayed outside for maybe 15
       | minutes and then went back inside. An hour later, I went outside
       | again and almost the whole sky was shining in all different
       | colors and forms, from patches to clouds to pillars that seemed
       | to support the heavens, ever chaning. Incredible.
        
         | weinzierl wrote:
         | Is your village north, middle or south Germany. Just curious
         | how much I missed:-/
        
           | sagischwarz wrote:
           | Mid-west, in an area called Hunsruck.
        
             | weinzierl wrote:
             | Thanks, I'm in Bavaria, so there might have been be a
             | chance and the other comments say there are more solar
             | storms upcoming. Definitely will have my eyes in the sky
             | tonight. The images are amazing, btw.
        
               | samus wrote:
               | It should definitely have been possible to see it from
               | Bavaria. It was definitely visible in northern Italy. Big
               | cities might have to much light pollution though. Let's
               | hope we get lucky tonight.
        
             | h4ckerle wrote:
             | OT but I didn't realise until now the Hunsruck was a real
             | place... I always assumed it was invented for Werwolfe von
             | Dusterwald!
        
         | teekert wrote:
         | In southern Netherlands at the coast, with a 10 sec exposure,
         | iPhone 12 mini, main cam, I was able to see some pink and green
         | with streaks. To my eyes it was like faint clouds that changed
         | to quickly to be clouds, better visible when I didn't look
         | straight at them. Your pics are something else, but what was it
         | like to your eyes?
        
           | sagischwarz wrote:
           | The colors in my pics are a bit more intense than they were
           | to the eyes, but not by that much. They were all clearly
           | visible, including all the structures, glowing. It is pretty
           | dark where I come from, the next city is dozens of kilometers
           | away.
        
           | fch42 wrote:
           | From Bournemouth in the UK, I got the same impression as you
           | - looking like cloud sheets, but more straight lines than,
           | say, what windblown contrails look like. No clear color
           | visible to me but the location wasn't anywhere near "dark".
           | 
           | I've seen impressive (and colorful) aurora before, and can
           | well imagine it might've looked splendid in (darker) places.
           | Don't give up ... maybe more on the way.
        
           | clmul wrote:
           | In the east of the Netherlands I was seeing something similar
           | to what you describe, but when particularly active I also saw
           | a reddish glow in places. This is a timelapse I made around
           | the same time: https://imgur.com/a/kloWEOl
        
         | beretguy wrote:
         | Thank you for not linking to Twitter.
        
       | tolerantgravity wrote:
       | 9 hours later and we saw similar sights in the Pacific Northwest
       | in the US! Pretty awesome.
        
       | kilianinbox wrote:
       | Stockholm Sweden at ~4am
       | https://x.com/aimkilian/status/1789188389108933097?s=46&t=Md...
        
       | msephton wrote:
       | Can't believe I slept through this.
        
         | dan_can_code wrote:
         | You may get another chance tonight.
        
       | xanderlewis wrote:
       | I'm in Aberdeen for the weekend. Saw nothing whatsoever.
        
         | wiredfool wrote:
         | Me too, but it's because I slept through it. Feeling better
         | now.
        
       | weinzierl wrote:
       | I am sad that I missed it. I there some sort of forecast service
       | that tells when there is a good chance to see an aurora in a
       | particular place?
        
         | ricardo81 wrote:
         | I also missed it. Meant to be happening again tonight though.
        
           | Ladsko wrote:
           | Tonight at which location? Europe? I might go for a impromptu
           | camping trip!
        
             | ricardo81 wrote:
             | Apparently much of the Northern Hemisphere, going by how
             | many photos I've seen across the world from last night.
             | 
             | Here in the UK the skies should be clear.
        
         | doodlebugging wrote:
         | If you go to https://spaceweather.com they have a link for text
         | alerts when these things are about to happen.
         | 
         | That is one way.
         | 
         | I visit that site and a similar site for CME and space weather
         | information: https://www.spaceweatherlive.com
         | 
         | There is a lot to see and to follow. I just came back inside
         | after snapping pics since just after dark here in N Texas. We
         | had a good show that started off behind the clouds but it was
         | bright enough to shine through the clouds. Then a few hours
         | later after the clouds cleared it was great. My camera battery
         | quit on me. I used three cameras tonight and only really got
         | usable photos from my iphone, whose camera I normally hate
         | because it always seems to process images after I take them.
         | Part of it is probably on me since I haven't taken the time to
         | study how to optimize settings.
         | 
         | Anyway. Tomorrow should be another good day for this. Keep your
         | eyes on the sky!
        
           | Ladsko wrote:
           | I'd also recommend checking a website like
           | https://www.lightpollutionmap.info to find an area nearby
           | that has less light pollution.
        
         | joshvm wrote:
         | Yes, you can use the NOAA forecast site which will show the
         | "oval" and has 24 hour/30min predictions. Or Space Weather Live
         | has some location forecasts. Generally if you don't live at a
         | high latitude you need a very strong display to see anything.
         | There's usually a bit of warning for storms like this, as
         | various solar observation satellites can beam back images of
         | the CME faster than the solar wind takes to get here.
         | 
         | The keywords to use are "space weather forecast <country>"
         | 
         | https://www.spaceweatherlive.com/
        
       | xinayder wrote:
       | I'm on a trip visiting my friend in Central Finland and yesterday
       | we had a 96% warning for aurora chance. Unfortunately, for us,
       | the sky was quite cloudy and we didn't get a chance to see the
       | lights. When we were heading back home I saw a faint line of
       | blueish-purple in the sky, which seemed unusual, and told my
       | friends "hey what if this is the aurora". I checked the photos
       | from the other people that claimed they saw the lights and it
       | checked out with what I've seen.
        
       | sgt101 wrote:
       | How did this compare to the Carrington event?
        
         | inamorty wrote:
         | You could read a newspaper from the light in the middle of the
         | night during the Carrington event, so not comparable at all.
        
           | heavenlyblue wrote:
           | Citation needed
        
             | inamorty wrote:
             | Sure thing: https://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/20050210157
             | /downloads/20...
        
         | beretguy wrote:
         | That's what I want to know but everybody just talks about how
         | pretty it is. I want to know if it was dangerous to our
         | electronics, and if not then how close it came to being
         | dangerous, you know, small things like that.
        
           | samus wrote:
           | If it was dangerous, we would know by now. As it is, we are
           | still able to use the internet. Major outages would be all
           | over the news.
        
             | anileated wrote:
             | The current storm hit G5
             | (https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/news/g5-conditions-observed),
             | it's officially "off the charts" if it gets any stronger.
             | 
             | By the time you cannot use Internet, it's too late--and it
             | won't be all over the news because guess how we
             | make/broadcast/receive them. Worst case you won't even get
             | a radio transmission through.
        
       | kzisme wrote:
       | Super visible with the naked eye an hour and a half east of
       | Denver. At some points the whole sky turned colors from
       | green/pink/blue.
       | 
       | https://imgur.com/a/8TJpI5i
       | 
       | Some photos if anyone is interested
        
       | mkaszkowiak wrote:
       | This aurora was really powerful! I could see it with a naked eye
       | from a town in central Poland, despite cloudy weather and light
       | pollution. Feels great to finally see it in person
        
       | bcye wrote:
       | For those coming here during the day, they have a page with the
       | best images of tonight: https://www.foto-webcam.eu/webcam/bestof/
        
         | savolai wrote:
         | Here's a time archive of all the cams https://www.foto-
         | webcam.eu/2024/05/10/2230
        
       | moooo99 wrote:
       | I live in a relatively big city where light pollution is
       | obviously a huge thing. But the aurora was so strong that even we
       | were able to make it out, although not as intensively beautiful
       | as on all those webcam feeds
        
       | SenHeng wrote:
       | Does anyone have a direct link to the time period when the aurora
       | hits?
       | 
       | All I see is a beautiful sunny day.
        
         | DoingIsLearning wrote:
         | I think for most folks in Europe it was between 23:00 and 03:00
         | CET yesterday.
         | 
         | Not sure what future forecasts are. I guess NOAA will probably
         | have some prediction.
        
         | nalinidash wrote:
         | You can find the images here: https://www.foto-
         | webcam.eu/webcam/bestof/
         | 
         | Approx time(as per the snapshots): 10.05.24 22:00-11.05.24 4:20
        
         | pbhjpbhj wrote:
         | https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/weather/specialist-forecasts/sp...
         | 
         | shows a video-style timeline of predictions for both Northern
         | and Southern hemisphere.
         | 
         | I'm not sure what "percentage" corresponds to visible aurorae
         | though, anyone know?
        
       | djhworld wrote:
       | I didn't see anything with the naked eye (UK), probably too much
       | light pollution, but I took a photo of the sky with my phone and
       | you could definitely see it.
        
         | Havoc wrote:
         | Same. Central London though so pretty hopeless on light
         | pollution anyway
        
       | divbzero wrote:
       | The sky has been lighting up in North America too. I've heard
       | reports of the aurora from New England and, here in the Pacific
       | Northwest, it's currently visible by naked eye and striking in
       | long exposure shots. I always thought I would have to visit
       | Alaska or Scandinavia to see the northern lights, never thought I
       | could catch a glimpse so close to home.
        
         | jayknight wrote:
         | It was visible to the naked eye in the city lights here around
         | Memphis, TN. I've seen pictures from the gulf coast. That was
         | so crazy!
        
         | mjh2539 wrote:
         | It was visible as far south as northern San Antonio last night.
        
       | jamesbfb wrote:
       | And parts of Melbourne, Australia too! Never in my life have I
       | seen this here. It's a wonderful thing to see.
        
         | sen wrote:
         | Central Victoria here, absolutely insane view with greens and
         | purples through the sky.
        
       | nojvek wrote:
       | Most of North US and Canada is also glowing pink today. Got many
       | messages from friends in Washington and BC.
       | 
       | What a wonderful sight.
        
       | btbuildem wrote:
       | Many of the photos here show it in such vivid colour, but for me
       | the really breathtaking part was the scale and movement of the
       | aurora.
       | 
       | Last night (here in Quebec) the entire sky was filled with
       | colour. It's not as intense in person, but the slow shimmer of it
       | is otherworldly. I was up on my roof for almost an hour, watching
       | the blobs undulate in the sky. I think it made a bigger
       | impression on me than the recent eclipse.
        
       | BillionAI wrote:
       | Girlfriend sent me pictures from Aarhus, DK. Was absolutely
       | stunning!
        
       | g7vrd wrote:
       | You can see the effects of the CME on the HF amateur radio bands.
       | 
       | This live map (https://g7vrd.co.uk/wspr/IO81) would usually be
       | full of worldwide contacts being reported by WSPR (Weak Signal
       | Propagation Reporter), but the solar flares have closed down the
       | bands quite considerably.
       | 
       | The map is centred on Maidenhead grid square IO81, but you can
       | change it to wherever you are: https://www.whatsmylocator.co.uk/
       | 
       | This will also cause problems with aircraft, as they use HF when
       | they're out of sight of land.
        
       | navane wrote:
       | why was all the news about eurovision songfestival and nothing
       | about this
        
         | Ylpertnodi wrote:
         | Israel?
        
       | aussieguy1234 wrote:
       | I saw a full aurora in Melbourne, Australia.
       | 
       | Colours, ribbons, arcs and beams all visible to the naked eye and
       | on camera.
       | 
       | Normally with aurouras, you only get to see a faint greyish glow
       | on the horizon and it only looks good on camera. Not this time.
        
         | 77pt77 wrote:
         | Aurora australis are dimmer than aurora borealis.
        
       | pmarreck wrote:
       | I have no idea what's going on because I have a toddler. Can
       | someone catch me up here?
        
       | _giorgio_ wrote:
       | Did anyone screenshot it?
        
       | atulatul wrote:
       | Off topic maybe but Europe is so beautiful. I wish I get to
       | travel across Europe with leisure.
        
       | alt0_ wrote:
       | Feel free to go outside in headphones and put this[0] on.
       | 
       | [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=086uhG3Rf3U
        
       | wslh wrote:
       | From Ushuaia, Argentina close to Patagonia:
       | https://www.reddit.com/r/argentina/comments/1cp89bf/aurora_a...
        
       | bsimpson wrote:
       | Now that it's over, the timestamp should be in the link:
       | 
       | https://www.foto-webcam.eu/webcam/lucknerhaus/2024/05/10/224...
        
       | thunkshift1 wrote:
       | Why is it pink and not green
        
       | jlrubin wrote:
       | i have the unique experience of being in a plane over the Bering
       | sea a few hours ago.
       | https://twitter.com/JeremyRubin/status/1789273537179426922
       | 
       | i was going nuts in my seat and seemed to be the only one on the
       | plane aware of what was going on.
        
         | boringg wrote:
         | Ive had a similar experience but looking at massive forest
         | fires outside and noone in the cabin caring in the least bit.
         | Its a strange thing.
        
         | Havoc wrote:
         | I've got a flight tonight at 23:00 so hopefully can secure a
         | window seat!
        
       | rpmisms wrote:
       | Is anyone else experiencing slow Internet during this? I'm not
       | sure if it's related or confirmation bias, but it's been crawling
       | since the storm hit.
        
       | spongebobism wrote:
       | Is it the Aurora or is it the Eurovision finals? We may never
       | know...
        
       | lytfyre wrote:
       | Went about an hour north of Vancouver BC Canada to get away from
       | bit city lights and watch.
       | 
       | It was probably not the brightest small strands I've ever seen -
       | if my memories of Northern Saskatchewan as a kid are still
       | accurate - but I don't think I've seen the whole sky light up to
       | such an extent.
       | 
       | here's a photo:
       | https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2Fu...
       | 
       | magenta and green colours were clearly visible in person during
       | the intense periods, although obviously not as bright or intense
       | as long exposure photos. Solidly visible bands for at least the
       | two hours I stayed out.
        
       | GTP wrote:
       | I missed it last night, but I heard it will repeat it tonight.
       | I'm going to try to see it. It's unheard of at this latitute,
       | currently I'm on an island in Tuscany, center of Italy.
       | 
       | Edit: I found online that the last one visible from Italy was in
       | 2003, so not unheard of but still rare.
        
       | andrewstuart wrote:
       | Clearly no-one read Day of the Triffids.
       | 
       | Don't look.
        
       | Sparkyte wrote:
       | Can it be seen with the naked eye? I didn't see anything last
       | night.
        
       | 082349872349872 wrote:
       | Sorry all, had the following comment in the wrong thread
       | yesterday:
       | 
       | My unindicted co-conspirator is a much bigger fan of song
       | contests than I am, but sometimes you just have to wonder at the
       | production values:
       | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lyUsNgu4GAI&t=550s
        
       | globular-toast wrote:
       | Went out into a meadow near town last night. Couldn't see a
       | thing. Light pollution was probably too bad. But it was really
       | funny to see a bunch of people milling about in the meadow at
       | almost midnight. Many of them idiots walking around with phone
       | torches destroying their and everyone else's night vision.
       | 
       | The shocking thing to me, though, is the number of satellites in
       | the sky. This was a shit sky, way beyond what people would call
       | "milky". Hardly any stars visible. But everywhere you looked
       | there were satellites. I remember it being rare to see one only
       | 15 years ago. Almost couldn't believe you could really see them
       | back then. But now... Everywhere. I had no idea how congested it
       | was getting up there. Wish I could leave Earth. But also glad we
       | can't because we'd fuck that up too.
        
       | vbilopav wrote:
       | I thought it was because of Eurovision
        
       | djha-skin wrote:
       | We went out to Simpson Springs in Utah to see the borealis. There
       | was a bit of a flare up. Like others have said it looked like
       | streaky fog to the naked eye. My camera picked up something a
       | little better. My wife's camera was a Samsung Galaxy Ultra S21
       | and she picked up gold it looks so good on her camera but anyway
       | here's my shot.
       | 
       | https://linksharing.samsungcloud.com/jytxIMvelaGs
       | 
       | You can see the lights of dugway Utah in the background
        
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