Tonight one of the strongest geomagnetic storms in recent years occurred, pushing the auroras incredibly south in the northern hemisphere, so much so that the show of colored lights in the sky was visible as far away as Southern Italy and even as far as Malta and Tunisia. Also the Planetarium Astronomical Observatory of Basilicata published the beautiful photos of the aurora seen from on its Facebook page Power.
The Planetarium also explained the reason for the red color of the auroras spotted in our latitudes: “the main cause lies in the interaction of oxygen at high altitudes, from low latitudes like in Italy we can see the auroras of the upper atmosphere well. The solar wind that causes auroras interacts at multiple levels in the Earth’s atmosphere and with different elements”. Then the invitation for this evening: “next night looking north you could still see it. Take some time and try to admire.”
Continue reading on MeteoWeb
