Given a solar storm is on the horizon for Wednesday & Thursday, July 12th and 13th, the news has been buzzing about the possibility of the northern lights being visible in parts of about 17 states and Canada. According to Time Magazine's article "How You Can See the Northern Lights This Week Across the U.S," those states include those in the northern half of the United States (listed here alphabetically): Idaho, Indiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New York North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota, Washington, Wisconsin, Wyoming, and Vermont. Depending on where you live will indicate where and when you may see them.
I decided to look it up as I only had a cursory knowledge of what this light wave show was all about. I learned that actually, this phenomenon of beauty is actually the result of a storm of energized sun particles hitting the Earth, which is mainly protected by our planetary magnet field--except at the poles. This quote from space.com's article "Northern Lights (Aurora Borealis): What They Are & How to See Them" (by Stefanie Walden and Daisy Dobrijevic) had a great tagline:
"The northern lights are an atmospheric phenomenon that's regarded as the Holy Grail of skywatching."This video from The Brain Stuff Show tells even more, including some mythology and also how it was named "aurora borealis" by Galileo Galilei in 1619.
According to Time Magazine's article, here's the best way to see the aurora borealis:
- 10 pm to 2 am in your local time zone.
- Find a north-facing view without a lot of skyline, homes, or tree clutter in the way. (Higher ground may help with this.) However, lights could come from any direction.
- The further you are from light pollution of city lights the better.
- Weather and clouds could block visibility.
Can't get enough? Read more by checking out these articles:
- Smithsonian Magazine's "The Northern Lights Could Dazzle the U.S. This Week"
- NPR's "The Northern Lights are Coming to Several States This Week. Here's How to See Them"
- CBS News' "Solar Storm on Thursday Expected to Make Northern Lights Visible in Maryland, Other States"
Title image created using canva.com; Map image from https://www.woodtv.com/weather/clouds-may-block-aurora-display-this-week-for-west-michigan/, video from https://youtu.be/eJV_wlCm6ms,
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