Talk Morgan Forums Community The Malvern Arms Northern Lights

Assuming clear dark skies, there is an increased chance of seeing the aurora on 1st and 2nd February. In the UK, those in Scotland, northern England and Northern Ireland may have the best opportunities.

This is due to the expected increased disturbance in the Earth’s magnetic field (known as a geomagnetic STORM) as a result of an Earth-directed Coronal Mass Ejection or CME. This CME launched from the Sun on Saturday, 29th of January and is expected to arrive at Earth within the next 36 hrs.

For more information please visit:
https://geomag.bgs.ac.uk/data_service/space_weather/alerts/alert_2022-01-31.html

For current geomagnetic activity levels please see:
http://geomag.bgs.ac.uk/data_service/space_weather/Global_activity_now.html

For more advice on viewing the Northern Lights please visit:
http://www.geomag.bgs.ac.uk/education/viewing_aurora.html

Spaceweather.

GEOMAGNETIC STORM WATCH: A minor G1-class geomagnetic storm is possible on Feb. 5th or 6th when Earth enters a stream of solar wind flowing from a hole in the sun's atmosphere. Arctic sky watchers should be alert for an episode of bright auroras on those dates.

Thanks for the information Graham. There's a fair bit of activity tonight.
These taken through glass with a crappy phone camera.

Good stuff Gordon.
Further chance over the weekend, too.

I've started using the Glendale app, you get notified when there's anything going on. It also shows where users that report are located.
Looks like last nights activity could be seen quite far South.

Just enough light cloud over the coast to spoil it here last night ... glad you got to see it Gordon (what time were the pics taken?)

Hopefully plenty of chances to see them again as we run up to the 2025 maximum 🙂

K

These two pictures were taken around 9.30pm Keith, I think it disappeared soon afterwards.
Fingers crossed for a clear sky tonight, the forecast is for higher activity than last night. I might venture out in the car to somewhere with less light pollution from neighbouring houses.

Here's a picture from the Glendale app posted by a member on Skye. Obviously NOT taken with a phone!!!

Spaceweather.

INTERPLANETARY SHOCK WAVE SPARKS COLORFUL AURORAS: This was not in the forecast. An unexpected interplanetary shock wave hit Earth's magnetic field on Feb. 11th. The impact sparked a G1-class geomagnetic storm and some very colorful auroras inside the Arctic Circle:

The shock wave was a small one and may have been a faint CME that escaped detection when it left the sun some days ago. This will happen increasingly often as Solar Cycle 25 intensifies. The sun is puffing out CMEs, hurling them in all directions, and some will inevitably slip through cracks in the forecast.

We had a picture in the local paper a couple of weeks ago - it showed a bit of auroral green in the distance looking out over Cardigan bay. Doing a web search it seems this is much more common than I thought!

That's interesting Jon.
I didn't think visual aurora came so far south often. At least there should be little light QRM out over the bay!