Researchers these days recognise that there are really only two main forms of aurora: the arc (discrete), and the patchy, pulsating aurora (diffuse). These are created by fundamentally different physical processes.
Are there any types of auroras?
Just as there are many types of aurora, there are many different mechanisms that accelerate auroral particles into the atmosphere. Electron aurora in Earth’s auroral zone (i.e. commonly visible aurora) can be split into two main categories with different immediate causes: diffuse and discrete aurora.
How many auroras are there?
Depending on how you count, there are as many as 27 Auroras in existence today. They are found on both coasts and from Minnesota to Texas, but tend to favor the North for reasons I discovered as I traveled.
What is the rarest aurora?
red aurora
The aurora borealis had made an appearance in rare and spectacular form: the blood aurora. So opened series two of Fortitude last week, a popular TV series set in a fictional town in Arctic Norway. But a red aurora is a real and spectacular scientific phenomenon, and one steeped in mythology.
What is the rarest color of aurora borealis?
red
The most common auroral color, a pale yellowish-green, is produced by oxygen molecules located about 60 miles above the earth. Rare, all-red auroras are produced by high-altitude oxygen, at heights of up to 200 miles. Nitrogen produces blue or purplish-red aurora.
What is an Aurora Corona?
Sometimes when the auroral activity peaks, the aurora becomes very bright, structured and fast: we call it a coronal aurora or corona. During a sub-storm, the overhead aurora usually goes from a diffuse narrow band to a wider display that covers much of the sky.
How often do auroras occur?
“Active periods are typically about 30 minutes long and occur every two hours, if the activity is high. The aurora is a sporadic phenomenon, occurring randomly for short periods or perhaps not at all.”
What states have an aurora?
| Aurora, Colorado | |
|---|---|
| Aurora Location of the City of Aurora in the United States. | |
| Coordinates: 39°42′39″N 104°48′45″W | |
| Country | United States |
| State | Colorado |
Who was the goddess aurora?
Aurōra (Latin: [au̯ˈroːra]) is the Latin word for dawn, and the goddess of dawn in Roman mythology and Latin poetry. Like Greek Eos and Rigvedic Ushas, Aurōra continues the name of an earlier Indo-European dawn goddess, Hausos.
What does Borealis mean?
The word borealis is Latin for boreal, which simply means “northern.” The aurora borealis is not the only aurora on Earth. The aurora in the Southern Hemisphere is called aurora australis or the southern lights.
Is red aurora rare?
A blazing display in 1938 lit the sands of the Sahara Desert in northern Africa. Deehr and his date witnessed one of the most spectacular displays in 1958. Others have happened in 1989, 2000 and 2001. Great red auroras are rare because they require a perfect mix of heavenly conditions.
Can auroras be white?
Auroras get their colors from specific elements in Earth’s upper atmosphere. Green auroras, for instance, come from atomic oxygen; blue is associated with molecular nitrogen. No element produces white.
When was the last red aurora?
On the nights of March 12 and 13 this year, many Alaskans saw an extraordinary gift from the sun: a stunning display of the northern lights with great patches of red aurora. Three days earlier on the sun, enormous flares had erupted.
What causes pink aurora?
Pink and dark red: Occasionally, the lower edge of an aurora will have a pink or dark red fringe, which is produced by nitrogen molecules at altitudes of around 100 km . Red: A bit higher in the atmosphere (at altitudes of 300 to 400 km ), collisions with oxygen atoms produce red auroras.
What is a green aurora?
Most solar particles typically collide with our atmosphere at an altitude of around 60 to 150 miles where there are high concentrations of oxygen. When the Oxygen is “excited” at these altitudes it causes the Aurora to appear in shades of green.
What is a red aurora?
On occasion the aurora gets a deep red color. This comes from higher altitudes, around 120-180 miles (200-300 km). It is again the oxygen atom that is responsible for this color.
Can you see aurora from a plane?
Seeing the Northern Lights from a plane
Seeing the Northern Lights from thousands of feet in the air is a unique experience because the lights appear brighter from the sky than from the ground. It is also easier to see the subtle dancing movements that the lights make.
Are there Southernlights?
In the north, the phenomenon is called the aurora borealis or the northern lights. In the Southern Hemisphere, it’s the aurora australis, or southern lights. The name is different and it turns out that the view from each pole can be different too.
What do the northern lights look like in person?
Simply put, most auroras are green. That would be the shortest and scientifically correct answer, (there are other colours of the aurora but green is the most commonly observed and relevant colour to this question). However, it doesn’t always appear green to our eyes.
Is an Aurora harmful to humans?
The Northern Lights occur so high up in the atmosphere that they don’t pose any threat to people watching them from the ground. The aurora itself is not harmful to humans but the electrically charged particles produced could have some potentially negative effects to infrastructure and technology.
Do the Northern Lights make noise?
What is clear is that the aurora does, on rare occasions, make sounds audible to the human ear. The eerie reports of crackling, whizzing and buzzing noises accompanying the lights describe an objective audible experience – not something illusory or imagined.