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KIRUNA, SWEDEN – MARCH 7: The Aurora Borealis, commonly known as the Northern Lights, are seen in … [+]
A geomagnetic storm caused by a flurry of coronal mass ejections, or CMEs, from the sun in recent days is now underway here at Earth. The result could be radio and power outages and brilliant aurora borealis (a.k.a. Northern Lights) visible unusually far south.
NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center reported a minor (G1) geomagnetic storm overnight Monday into Tuesday morning as charged plasma from the CMEs began to arrive and collide with Earth’s magnetosphere. NOAA forecasts that the intensity will pick up and that we could see a strong (G3) storm later on Tuesday.
The agency has also extended its expectation of at least moderate (G2) storming to occur on Wednesday and Thursday as well.
“Should the forecast conditions occur during the late evening hours, the aurora could become visible as far south as the northeast US through the upper Midwest, and across the rest of the northern states,” NOAA said in a statement.
Very subtle aurora were captured on camera from Kansas, arguably much farther south than they should have been visible. This is due in part to the fact that cameras are able to “see” aurora better than the human eye, so it may be worth trying to look for Northern Lights with your phone rather than your biological retinas.
At the moment, the forecast has the strongest part of the storm arriving in the Tuesday afternoon daylight hours for the United States, but like terrestrial weather, these things can be notoriously fickle and difficult to forecast. Keep in mind that the historic aurora show seen in May was forecast to be a strong geomagnetic storm, but surprised many when it actually arrived as an extreme event generating nearly worldwide auroral visibility.
Behind all this is a whole bunch of sunspot activity on the visible side of the sun facing us. These sunspots throw off solar flares, which are often accompanied by CMEs that trigger the aurora.
“Flare probabilities have increased and M-class flares are now expected through most of the week, with a slight chance to chance of X-class activity,” NOAA explained.
Just last week we saw the most powerful X-class flare in nearly two decades erupt from the far side of the sun. The area that generated is now rotating into view to face us, meaning more rough space weather in the coming days.
