Apparently the solar flares the Sun has been coughing up caused the Northern Lights to appear as far south as Texas and Florida last night. As usual I missed it, and as usual it was cloudy around here anyway. Still, others were able to get some pretty impressive photographs. Here’s a collection of photos from recent sightings. Here’s an animated GIF of the October 28 solar flare. And here’s an animated GIF of an aurora borealis sighting in Alaska.The source of all this activity is Sunspot 10486. Here’s a photograph of that cluster; and to give you a sense of its incredible size, just remember the blue dot at the bottom is the size of the Earth in comparison. It really gives a feel of the immensity of our Sun.
Scientists report there was another solar flare late yesterday, so we can expect to get hit with another proton storm some time today. Maybe it will be clear enough to see something tonight. One of my life’s ambitions is to see the Northern Lights, but this Aurora Predictions page suggests that will be unlikely tonight.
