While Thanksgiving may be cool and rainy in many parts of the country, solar storms may provide a glimpse of the Northern Lights for some in the US.
Small to moderate geomagnetic storms are likely Thursday and Friday, thanks to a filament eruption on Monday that saw the sun shoot a cloud of high-energy plasma toward Earth, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
That outburst now heralds the possibility that the U.S. night sky could glow green, red and purple during the Thanksgiving holiday.
How bright the auroras are and how long they last in the sky depends on how strong the solar storms become, and whether they reach G1 or G2 conditions at all, NOAA meteorologist Mike Bettwy said in an email.
“This is not expected to be a widespread event and is likely to last only short intervals and could be quite weak in affected areas,” Bettwy said.
Those in states like Washington, Montana, the Dakotas, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan and Maine are ready to see the Northern Lights this holiday weekend, and those in the northern parts of Idaho, Wyoming, New York, Vermont and New Hampshire have a chance also when seeing the aurora borealis, according to NOAA.
The Northern Lights will most likely be visible Thursday evening into early Friday, when NOAA experts predict minor (G1) and moderate (G2) geomagnetic storms, although it’s not clear exactly when and where the sky will light up.
Viewers wanting a glimpse can track the latest activity and forecasts on NOAA’s Aurora Dashboard. It also provides short-term forecasts of the Northern Lights, including maps of where it will be visible and experimental tools that estimate its intensity.
In clear weather it is best to look at the bright lights. Areas of cloud cover will likely limit viewing across much of the Northeast and New England, and near the Great Lakes, Bettwy said.
Unlike stronger solar storms that offered many in the U.S. a view of the Northern Lights earlier this year, Bettwy said don’t expect major disruptions to the country’s communications systems this time around unless the storms turn out to be larger than predicted. .
The Northern Lights, or aurora borealis, are usually only visible at high altitudes, but intense enough solar storms can make them visible in areas much further south than normal.
These solar storms happen when coronal mass ejections, or eruptions from the Sun, send giant clouds of plasma into space. When these plasma clouds are aimed at Earth, the plumes of charged particles collide with the planet’s magnetic field and interact with atoms and molecules in the upper atmosphere, creating radiant auroras.
The sun goes through roughly 11-year activity cycles, from minimum to maximum. According to NOAA, it is gearing up for an expected peak in July next year. That’s why there have been a number of occasions this year when the Northern Lights have been visible this far south.
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
