Category: History of Science

I hope many of you saw auroras (northern lights) last night! I briefly saw the strongest steady red glow I myself have ever observed, visible even amid street lights and my neighbors’ house lights.

Then, after a break as some clouds rolled in, we were graced with a few hours of mostly diffuse green glow with patches of dim but distinct red that would come and go. All these colors were visible with the naked eye, albeit much less bright than shown in photos. It was quite a storm, not as violently active as the one earlier this year, but very persistent.

I also tried to find Comet A3 just after sunset, but failed, even with the help of binoculars. Apparently the brief spike in its brightness, due to “forward scattering” as it passed between us and the Sun, may have died off too quickly, leaving it impossible to see in early twilight. It will become dimmer day by day, but it will also be visible later each evening, and at some point should become easy to see in dark skies. Let me know when you first observe it!

It could be quite a night!

A powerful solar flare (an explosion on the Sun) about 36 hours ago created a large and fast coronal mass ejection (a cloud of subatomic particles heading away from the Sun) that is due to arrive at Earth in the next few hours (it will show up less than an hour before it arrives as chaos in this data.) UPDATE: IT HAS ARRIVED; IF IT’S DARK WHERE YOU ARE, GO LOOK. That could mean problems for the electrical grid. It could also mean strong auroras (northern and southern lights) far from the poles. The timing, if correctly predicted, is such that Asia and Europe may have the best chances, but the auroras could potentially last until it is dark in the Americas too.

Also, just after sunset tonight, we may with difficulty be able to see Comet A3 (short for Comet C/2023 A3 Tsuchinshan-ATLAS ). The comet is bright — some reports give it a brightness comparable to the planet Venus, although more diffuse — but so is twilight. UPDATE: I HAVE BEEN WARNED THAT THE RAPID BRIGHTNING PERIOD, DUE TO A LIGHT SCATTERING EFFECT, MAY ALREADY BE OVER. IF SO, THE STATEMENTS HERE MAY BE TOO OPTIMISTIC. The comet is roughly ten Sun-widths above and slightly to the right of the Sun, and should be visible 15-30 minutes after sunset if you have a low and mostly cloudless horizon. Best bet is to bring binoculars and scan the sky; you’ll notice it much more easily, even if it is visible to the naked eye.

Each day following, the comet will be higher in the sky at sunset, making it more visible in late twilight, but it will also become intrinsically dimmer. Experts seem to disagree about when it will be at its best, but this weekend should be good, if not before.

Added 5pm NYC time : Here’s what the data looked like showing the arrival of the coronal mass ejection, a few hours ago, at the ACE satellite, which gives us about an hour’s warning here on Earth:

Added 5pm NYC time: Here’s what the data looks like showing an ongoing geomagnetic storm and likely auroras; warning, the data is delayed 3 hours, so it’s not showing you what’s happening right now. “UTC” is 5 hours ahead of New York (i.e. Eastern) time, one hour behind Central European time.