Stunning aurora glow above Iceland after ‘dead’ sunspot erupts
A Sunspot that “woke from the dead” last week and erupted in a mid-size solar flare along with a mass ejection of plasma, also illuminating the northern skies with brilliant lights. A stunning image of the effect featured the aurora appearing to rain through the clouds over Iceland.
This aurora’s rays shone near Goðafoss waterfall, which is about 45 minutes from Akureyri, Iceland’s second largest city.
“The nighttime window of darkness is shrinking here at latitude 65.7 degrees north, just 60 miles south of the Northern polar circlewhich makes the aurora spectacle even more valuable,” said photographer Todd Salat from AuroraHunter.comtold SpaceWeather.com.
“Soon the summer sunlight will make it too hard to see the lights until fall,” continued Salat. A nearly full moon also competed for light space here, but those Icelandic auroras would not be denied.”
The glow northern lights were generated by an intermediate solar storm associated with a satellite-observed explosion of solar particles. The exploded sunspot was poetically referred to as “dead” because it had recently erupted and become part of a quiescent sunspot. Even so, air molecules high up in the atmosphere were excited as these sun particles interacted with Earth’s magnetic field lines, creating the incredible celestial show.
Related: NASA plans to launch 2 rockets into the Northern Lights
on Facebook, Salat told viewers that this is the first time he’s seen auroras of this magnitude during a planned two-week trip from his hometown of Anchorage, Alaska, to Iceland. It was Salat’s ninth night in Iceland and he had only caught fleeting glimpses of the Northern Lights before. Then the weather forecast changed.
“I set up camp earlier in the day in light rain and the weather forecast for Iceland was cloud and scattered showers for the whole week [be] so demoralizing,” Salat said.
While tempted to “put down the Aurora cameras,” he tripped over the waterfall during a drive. He was taking some test shots when he spotted a glow between the clouds.
“I picked up my pace, and as I saw a spike developing, I broke into an all-out sprint until my lungs were on fire to position myself for this composition. Boom, at 11:47pm, maybe the best aurora shot in the world, trip up to that point went into the game bag and I was hooked.”
Salat saw the clouds temporarily obscure the view, but they opened up briefly around 2 a.m. local time, allowing him to take a few more shots.
“I’ve been on many aurora hunts in my life, but I don’t know if I’ve ever ‘worked’ as hard to get the shots as I did for this one,” he continued on Facebook. “I’m 3,336 miles away [5,369 km] from my home in Anchorage, Alaska and live in an RV. I’m glad it’s not forever, but I love it and look forward to living in the now. Time to hit the road and see what’s around the next corner.”
Article originally published on LiveScience.
Stunning aurora glow above Iceland after ‘dead’ sunspot erupts Source link Stunning aurora glow above Iceland after ‘dead’ sunspot erupts
