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Breathtaking northern lights splash across the night skies as far south as Florida
A powerful burst of energy from the sun is streaming past Earth, disturbing energized particles in the highest levels of the atmosphere and painting stunning aurora borealis displays across the night sky as far south as Texas, Alabama, Georgia and even north Florida.
Several eruptions of energy from the sun, known as coronal mass ejections, or CMEs, are expected to reach Earth’s magnetic field over the next two nights. The Space Weather Prediction Center issued a G4 “severe” geomagnetic storm watch for Tuesday and Wednesday. G4 is the second-strongest level on the five-step scale.
An aurora in Nelson County, Virginia, on Tuesday night. – Tommy Stafford
An aurora in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, on Tuesday night. – Matthew Dux
An aurora seen in Crested Butte, Colorado on Tuesday night. – Leslie Perrot
What a G4 storm means
Geomagnetic storms happen when the solar wind rushes through Earth’s magnetosphere. Charged particles from the sun interact with gases in the Earth’s atmosphere, causing stunning northern lights, or glowing curtains of green, red and purple light that ripple across the sky.
It’s not all beauty and wonder; a G4 storm brings potential for voltage control problems in power systems, GPS navigation errors and intermittent issues with radio and satellite operations.
An aurora seen in Ankeny, Iowa, on Tuesday night. – Matt Beatty
This latest round of solar eruptions includes several CMEs from an active sunspot cluster. The storm may ease slightly by Wednesday but could stay elevated through midweek — along with the chance to see the northern lights farther south than normal.
For most people, the impacts will be limited to breathtaking skies, not power outages. But it’s a good reminder that no matter how advanced we become as a society, the sun still calls the shots.
An aurora seen in Crested Butte, Colorado on Tuesday night. – Leslie Perrot
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