BellaOnline Forums Education Astronomy Aurorae - Polar Light Shows

There's a glow on the northern horizon. The Sun set hours ago and there are no city lights there. You could be seeing nature's great polar light show - an aurora. It's most likely if you're fairly far north or south, but a solar storm may include mid-latitudes too.

Aurorae - Polar Light Shows

This is a recent example of a beautiful aurora from Finland. The color is very natural-looking for a bright aurora. It's mostly a grey-green, but there are touches of pink. A weak aurora may have no color at all. But the wonderful shapes also suggest a fairly active aurora - look at the vivid curtains that cover the sky.

Most videos of aurorae are timelapse. This is why the aurorae seem to move so quickly, which is generally not realistic. Except for a very strong display, they tend to move rather slowly. Until recently, it's been almost impossible to capture a quick-moving aurora in realtime. But the technology now exists to do that.

Ole Salomonsen has just released the video "Soaring" which he's made from film he shot between late August and mid-November of this year. It includes "some of the wildest" aurorae he's ever seen. Impressive. Magnificent. (Color me slightly envious.)