Due to a large coronal mass ejection on the sun that is aimed at the Earth AND because it is predicted to be clear the next few days in western Washington, there is a very real possibility that you may be able to see the aurora borealis tonight and/or Friday night. Sounds like Friday night is the best possibility, but probably worth checking both nights. CMEs are huge eruptions of actual matter and energy from the sun, shooting enormous quantities of both out into space at very high velocities (the matter part only takes a few days to travel the 93,000,000 mi. to Earth). Most are not aimed at Earth, but this one evidently is. There is also a possibility for communications like cell phones to be disrupted in the next several days. We never know for sure what will happen until it arrives, as many variables can affect what happens in a given location.… The best time to view auroras is late at night (midnight-2:00 am), from the darkest possible location. But it is certainly worth checking the sky any time after twilight is over (from maybe 10:00 pm onward). Also, the more intense displays are in the northern part of the sky. Look for shimmering curtains of greenish glow in the sky and possibly other colors if we are really lucky. swpc.noaa.gov/
Posted on: Thu, 11 Sep 2014 21:20:19 +0000
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