Will it fry satellites and disturb modern day navigation?
The magnetic solar storm arranged a colourful show of aurora borealis in the night skies of Hyvinka in Southern Finland one early October 2003 morning. (Pekka Sakki/AFP/Getty Images)
And the upcoming peak should be a decent showing compared with recent cycles. The ramp-up to this “solar maximum” is already stronger than scientists thought, sending impressive punches of solar energy and particles to Earth in 2023 that brought rare aurora sightings to Arizona. It’s already produced more striking solar flares and eruptions than the last solar maximum in 2014.
Northern lights seen over Salia, Finland, on Sunday. (Alexander Kuznetsov via
SpaceWeather.com )
Lesser known Southern lights seen in NZ:
Aurora seen in the skies over Hoopers Inlet on New Zealand’s Otago Peninsula. (Ian Griffin via
SpaceWeather.com )
Skywatchers reported beautiful green, purple and red auroras across Sunday skies in some locations in Europe, New Zealand and parts of the northern United States — at least for a little bit. The auroras, also known as the northern and southern lights, were triggered by the fastest-moving solar storm in at least five years, but dwindled as the geomagnetic activity quickly waned.
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