Aurora season begins over Arctic

August 21, 2012 – SPACE – The long days of northern summer are coming to an end, and auroras are appearing in the darkening Arctic skies. “Yesterday I saw my first stars since last spring, and tonight the first auroras!” reports Fredrik Broms, who sends this picture from Kvaløya, Norway: “It felt almost unreal to see them dancing across the light blue sky where only Jupiter, Venus and the brightest of the stars were visible,” adds Broms. “I saw both green and red rays dancing over my head while standing barefoot in the grass – a somewhat unusual combination here in Tromsø! The return of the auroras was most welcome after a summer without any stars (save one).” More arctic auroras are in the offing tonight as a high-speed solar wind stream buffets Earth’s magnetic field. NOAA forecasters estimate a 25% to 30% chance of polar geomagnetic storms. –Space Weather