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Aurora Borealis Likely To Be Visible In Southern NY and PA Tonight
New submitter chromaexcursion writes "Several news source are reporting the likelihood of an impressive show of the Aurora Borealis visible as far south as Washington D.C. this evening. Accuweather explains: 'On the Kp index, the flare has been categorized at 6 to 8. This is a scale for measuring the intensity of a a geomagnetic storm. The 6 to 8 rating means that the effects of the radiation will have a greater reach. ... The radiation from such a flare may cause radio wave disturbances to electronics such as cell phones, GPS and radios, causing services to occasionally cut in and out. While traveling slower than was originally anticipated, the flare effects are moving towards Earth at 1000 km per second. ... The lights are currently estimated for 8 p.m. EDT Saturday arrival, with a possible deviation of up to seven hours.' Check the map; if you're in a fair-to-good zone, head out after sunset to see the show."
Just checked from the roof of a 22 story bulding, the view North is over East River, but nothing to be seen there. I guess New York is not famous for astronomy discoveres with all the smog and lights.
It's going to have to been pretty bright to compete with the skyglow present all along the Northeast metropolitan area. I haven't seen the Milky Way in years; the last time it was visible in my neighborhood was about ten years ago, during a region-wide blackout.
Unfortunately I get to stare at a whiteout blizzard instead... Too bad, last year had a wonderful night watching the northern lights with my wife from our hot tub (best way to do so!)
Within the last couple years, though, they're back with increasing frequency. I've been able to catch them at least twice each year for the last two years from Northern Wisconsin. And two years ago (I think), I had a friend that lives in Ohio that was able to clearly see them.
The best source for aurora visibility information is a forecast page run by the NOAA, but it's crushed under the load already, so I won't link it here. The second-best source is probably AccuWeather Astronomy's Facebook page or something like that. Anyway. Visibility hasn't even reached Maine yet.
The World Wide Web is dying. Soon, we shall have only the Internet.
No one else has yet chimed in with the obligatory aurora boreanaz.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aDguY0jtzBQ
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
Looking outside will do nothing for you, Give NOAA space weather a try! When a geomagnetic storm is in progress keep an eye out on the auroral oval and how far it reaches down in the picure. If your sky area is clear and the storm is not strong the lights can look like faint clouds that move slowly. (Keep an eye on these as they can break out and get stronger) Most people will want to use a camera with a long exposure setting (bulb mode) to see them.
I can't see squat up there from where I live. My cell phone service at home ordinarily oscillates between terrible and inexistent, so I can't observe an effect from it on that either.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
POES Auroral Activity (Refreshes every 5 minutes)
:)
Fancy OVATION forecast (refreshes every 30 secs)
There's apparently some media outlets doing facebook/twitter updates too, but A) I don't do either one and B) They're a lot less likely to contain actual information than the above.
Just drove out into the farmland with no lights. Nothing.
This website will send you emails when Aurora are likely - it's based in Edmonton so it works best for northerly locations with the same magnetic latitude but when the storm hits you should see the chance for Auroras spike in Edmonton as well - and you can sign up for an email if you don't want to watch the site.
The first impact of the CME has hit and the boulder Kp is hovering around 3. Watch it here.and here. Here in southern Minnesota, Kp has to hit 6 before we see anything. 5 up on the Canadian border. Good luck spotting those unicorns!
Obi-Wan: "I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were sudden
the op probably works for the TSA... what more can we expect?
This doesn't look like a joke, but something does seem off.
On the Kp index, the flare has been categorized at 6 to 8
Flares are not categorized with the Kp index. The Kp index is a scale for rating how large of a geomagnetic storm is going on. it is a non-linear scale of how much the Earth's magnetic field is deviating from typical value, as measured at several locations. Typically to get good auroras further south, you need both a high Kp index, which pushes the parts of the magnetic field lines bringing in solar wind and other stuff further away from the magnetic poles, and a source of particles to actually produce bright aurora. Solar storms do produce both, although there are situations where you can sometimes get one or the other.
Anyway, there several ways flares are rated, but the Kp index is not one of them. But it does factor into what into what to expect as far as aurora at more southernly locations. It is rather difficult to predict accurately from solar activity. The more accurate predictions are on short time scales using satellites in front of the Earth that can measure the solar magnetic field a few hours before variations hit us as carried by the solar wind. You can see the output of a model here, and so far it looks no where near as high as what Accuweather is suggesting. Although that model can be wrong at times, so it could still happen. For predictions and watches based on the space equivalent of weather men, you can find a chart of that here. While two days ago there was a watch made for a G2 level geomagnetic storm, which would be another way of describing a Kp=6 condition, the more recent updates and aurora circle maps show that current conditions are much short of that.
Nuttin.
It isn't moving south nearly as far as originally predicted/hoped.
http://www.facebook.com/pages/AccuWeathercom-Astronomy/178186248887910 The Bz isn't going negative. It still could, but it hasn't as of yet.
Hitchhiked a ride in Alaska; we were as outback as you can get
when the driver hit the brakes and pulled to the side of the road.
Scary a$$ stuff when you hitching a ride, but the driver saw the lights.
Pitch black, and not a sound could be heard as we were in the middle of nowhere.
We got out and watched them for awhile; they were like high speed clouds, rushing over us to swirl,
disappear, and repeat, no color these were just white, thus the cloud reference.
But the three of us can say we've heard the Northern Lights.
If you waited for it you could hear them, very subtle but very neat.
This was before public Internet and hard for others to accept, but now you can
find (google) many others who have heard them as well.
try turning off your screen and trying again...
Aurora Borealis? In your kitchen?!
I'll agree with the comments about there being zip lights. I checked all the so-called space weather sites I could think of, and absolutely no one was even aware of it. Here in north central WV, DC is about 150 miles due east of me, I went out several times to check, and while the sky was clear enough I found Polaris instantly, the only skylight was the usual glow from a 50k pop city 20 miles north.
As one commenter above said, we got bupkiss.
I can remember back in about '50 or '51, when we were testing nukes at high altitudes, we had some truly glorious northern lights in the farm country west of Des Moines, but its generally been pretty slim pickins since. So this turned out to be someone's wishful thinking ANAICT.
Cheers, Gene.
Booking a ticket to Hobart if the Aurora Australis is going to light up like this again.
You seem to regard science as some kind of dodge... or hustle.
The CME happened on Thursday, and the story only comes on the afternoon of the very night of the visibility of the event?
Timing fail. I'm not blaming slashdot for this one specifically, since the linked story itself only came out on Saturday as well, but really, it would have been nice to know about it 24 hours sooner.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Between you remembering '50 and '51, your nick and your ID something tells me you're tired :)
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
About as tired as you would expect a 78 yo diabetic to be. I just changed the blades on my 30 yo rider, which I had to jack up on a set of ramps, then pickup the front end about 20 inches so I could get my 1/2" impact wrench on the spindle bolts, and it will be about 1/2 an hour before my burning legs will feel like forking it and actually doing some of the first mowing of the year.
Getting old is not for wimps, I don't recommend it at all. ;-)
Cheers, Gene,
I'm in north central wv as well. I was outside from 5 to 930 and saw nothing but the usual stars.
this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom. -- Lincoln, Gettysburg Address
Nice to see active grown-ups on this site!
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
Better get in your time machine, 'cause the AccuWeather article talking about "tonight" is from April 13.
-- My hovercraft is full of eels.