THE skies across Scotland are set to be lit up by the Northern Lights for a SECOND night.
Shades of bright pink and green wowed Scots as they danced across the sky in areas which almost never get to see the stunning spectacle.
The celestial colour show, which is known as Aurora Borealis, is normally only visible in the far north of Scotland in places with very little light.
But last night they were spotted in Glasgow, parts of Lanarkshire including Motherwell and Airdrie, Bathgate in West Lothian, Stirling and Edinburgh.
It is extremely rare for the lights to be spotted in these areas but the phenomenon occurred amid a severe geomagnetic storm that hit the Earth for the first time in 20 years.
The Northern Lights are caused by solar particles reacting with the Earth‘s atmosphere.
Last night, the planet was hit by a severe geomagnetic storm where more solar wind shock waves hit the earth.
The major solar storm meant the lights were much more visible than normal, and could even be seen as far south as Exeter.
But anyone who missed the lights last night doesn’t need to worry, as they are set to return TONIGHT.
As the solar storm continues the Auroras will be visible in rare locations yet again.
Craig Snell, a forecaster at the Met Office, told The Scottish Sun it has been 20 years since solar storms this extreme brought such strong Auroras to Scotland.
He said: “There is a good chance to see them around midnight.
“There will be some cloud cover on the east coast that might make them hard to see but everywhere else will be clear and might see them.
“Unfortunately they won’t be as strong as last night as more CMEs (energy discharged from the sun) head in our direction.”
He advised those hoping to see the lights on Saturday to head to an area with low light pollution and to use a good camera, adding: “The best chance you have of seeing the lights is if you are away from street lights and areas with lots of light pollution, as any type of light does have a big effect.”
“Also, at this time of year, we are fighting the shorter length of nights, so it is unlikely that they will be visible until around 10.30pm or 11 o’clock when it gets really dark.”
Sightings in southern parts of the UK are less likely on Saturday, although Mr Snell said the lights might be visible through a strong camera lens.
The G5 geomagnetic storm, which is considered extreme and the strongest level of solar storm, hit Earth on Thursday. The cause of this storm was a “large, complex” sunspot cluster, 17 times the diameter of the Earth, according to the NOAA.
The Met Office - Tips for seeing an Aurora
- You need a clear night with no cloud cover
- Find a dark location with no light pollution
- Look toward the northern horizon
- Be cautious that geomagnetic activity can cause disturbances to satellite navigation (GNSS/GPS etc)
The last storm with a G5 rating hit Earth more than 20 years ago in October 2003 and caused power outages in Sweden, Professor Carole Haswell told the BBCRadio 4 Today Programme on Saturday morning.
Prof Haswell, head of astronomy at the OpenUniversity, said: “A lot of the satellites communicate using radio signals and all of these charged particles speeding around disrupt radio signals, particularly GPS which is used by planes can be disrupted so it can cause navigation problems, it can cause outages with satellites, it can bring down power systems.
“The last big G5 storm caused a power outage in Sweden and I haven’t heard of anything happening this time yet, so hopefully people have designed in sort of redundancies into their systems so that they can actually weather this sort of space weather.”
A spokesperson for the Energy Networks Association told the PA news agency they had been monitoring the solar storm and said that the UK’s electricity network continued to operate as normal on Saturday morning.
Prof Haswell also explained how different colours within the aurora are formed and said: “Green comes from oxygen which is about 80 to 250 miles above the earth’s surface.
“The purple, blue and pink comes from nitrogen and when you get a very strong aurora sometimes you see a sort of scarlet red, and that comes from oxygen which is higher in the earth’s atmosphere, at an altitude of about 180 miles.”
Aurora displays occur when charged particles collide with gases in the Earth’s atmosphere around the magnetic poles.
In the northern hemisphere, most of this activity takes place within a band known as the aurora oval, covering latitudes between 60 and 75 degrees.
When activity is strong, this expands to cover a greater area – which explains why displays can be occasionally seen as far south as the UK.
