The Mid-South and many parts of the country that normally don’t get to see it were treated to a celestial sight last night with the appearance of an Aurora Borealis in the sky, also known as the Northern Lights.
The view is rare for people in the Mid-South to see, but a solar wind event last night caused the nightly light show to be seen farther south than normal. The solar wind event was the strongest in 20 years, said the National Weather Service.
The activity occurs more often closer to the Earth’s pole, and is called Northern Lights in the Northern Hemisphere as Aurora Borealis and Southern Lights in the Southern Hemisphere, or Aurora Australis. The term Aurora Borealis comes from the Latin words aurora for “sunrise” and borealis for “to the north.”
Different atoms and molecules absorb and radiate their own unique set of colors when the Northern Lights take place. For instance, red hues come from nitrogen molecules and green is produced by oxygen molecules.
When you witness the Aurora Borealis, you’re observing a cosmic dance of charged particles and atmospheric chemistry.
Read more about the Aurora Borealis in this post from Space.com.
Many readers of the DeSoto County News Facebook page shared their views of the Northern Lights last night, some of which are shown here:
