25 October 2011

Northern Lights Visible As Far South As Alabama Monday Night (Updated)

Posted by Dan Satterfield


BREAKING NEWS!

Saturday’s coronal mass ejection has sparked a moderate to strong geomagnetic storm and the aurora borealis is visible as far south as North Alabama tonight. Go outside and look for a red/greenish glow in the sky. The Kp index is at 7 and this indicates a major geomagnetic storm. Spaceweather.com has some pics already up on their site and more to come I suspect.

The best view will be for those in the northern USA away from city lights. The image above was sent to the newsroom here in Huntsville (from Coldwater Creek Photography in Taft,TN).

19GMT Tuesday: The planetary Kp index is down to a 2 now so another display tonight is very unlikely. The last big display this far south was May of 1989. I held my (then 4 year old) daughter up to see the red and white curtains, dancing in the sky, over Ormond Beach, Florida! Some fantastic pics of the display last night are on spaceweather.com here.