Northern(Polar) Lights, Aurora Borealis, a question (especially people who saw)

[Athene]

Hello again everyone,

Actually I live in Norway, just for today, as you know Norway is popular for Northern Lights, which is very suitable to see in Northern Norway's nearly everytime night darkness winter times, which makes Northern Lights to see easier.

I have got opportunity, to see a beautiful game of Helius and the Mother Earth, itself. Unfortunately I haven't got any knowledge about Northern Lights. I talked with lots of Norwegians and I suprised that they just saw once, twice in their life, and for teenagers they never saw before!

I am curious how could it be. Once I was in Southern part of Norway and we were far from Edison's invention soI saw a very very nice Milky Way, and cloudless weather was a great luck and an old binocular I had

So now I want to take my chance on Northern part of Norway. I want to see Northern Lights, but how? I mean I found few websites, they can say the quality of Northern Lights but just 5 days earlier. Is it possible to say it will happen or not, I mean could it be calculated like Comets, the arrival and leaving? Or just a chance, because there are lots of people who has never saw and living near!

If yes, I can learn maybe 5, maybe a week ago, what do you recommend to take with me?

Please help me I really want to see, I really want to know

In another case, I am planning to see with friends, so I have to know a little, not to be embarrased

Thank you once again and Happy New Year

-Athene

[ENWOD]

Just from what i've read and heard, having not actually seen them myself (one of my life goals to see them though) Anyway, i think it is possible to predict them to a certain degree of accuracy, through looking at sunflares etc. Don't think you need to bring too much other than some warm clothes, somewhere to sit/lay and perhaps a camera... Think binoculars would be useless as it's such a widefield object... Hope that helped? Shall wait for a more experienced member to correct me though.

Josh.

[Athene]

Just from what i've read and heard, having not actually seen them myself (one of my life goals to see them though) Anyway, i think it is possible to predict them to a certain degree of accuracy, through looking at sunflares etc. Don't think you need to bring too much other than some warm clothes, somewhere to sit/lay and perhaps a camera... Think binoculars would be useless as it's such a widefield object... Hope that helped? Shall wait for a more experienced member to correct me though.

Josh.

Than I will wait for the greatest possibility to happen and when I learned 5 days ago, I will just go to North immediately with warmest clothes, not to be frozen out

[radioactive]

A good friend of mine recently returned from a trip to Lapland with his small daughter one of the tours he was booked to go on whilst there was a trip out to observe the Aurora its was rather dissappointing came his remark on his return just a bit of white flickering light in the sky he had expected much much more

I tried to explain that basically we are still near sunspot minimum and not much is happening enough to give out any actual real solar mass ejection which is what really excites the Earths Magnetic field and give out the great displays its known to have

Athene

I think NASA will be a good source to look at they have missions out there in space keeping a keen eye on the sun such as the SOHO craft that is doing hardly anything else but observe the suns behaviour I think mainly in the Xray Frequencies their are others out there too so if the old girl has a mood and coughs up something that would effect earth we can easily tell well in advance really a lot of the commercial Sat's rely on such info being available so I think it should not be too hard to predict some good aurora chances for a viewing trip

Hope you followed what I was trying to tell you My friend

[saturn5]

If you go to http://spaceweather.com/ you can subscribe to get emails telling you when aurora's are likely to happen or when there has been a CME which is likely to trigger an aurora.

[coulsaa]

Athene,

you might find this site of interest - not sure how uk-specific it is but maybe it will help for Norway too.

http://www.dcs.lancs.ac.uk/iono/aurorawatch/

I've had a few 'yellow' and 'red' email alerts suggesting likelihood of seeing the aurora that night - on one occasion I saw a magnificent show from here in south eastern Scotland.

Andy

[Dippus]

This is where i go to keep tabs on the suns activity

http://www.solarcycle24.com/

Regards

Mark

[dogfish]

Most of your questions have been answered already, but I just wanted to add that while it's possible to predict the aurora, I don't think that these predictions will give you more than a few hours advance warning. As we are at solar minimum at the moment, spectacular aurora displays are likely to be few and far between, best to wait a few years for the sun to start being more active if you want to guarantee a good display.

Cheers, Martin

[barkis]

You could make your own magnetometer. The device detects changes in the earths magnetic field, caused Coronal Mass Ejections. This is usually a precurser to the Northern Lights. There are two types of detector. A fluxgate magnetometer, this usually requires a pen recorder to be effective. Or a bell jar model, this is a simple device which is easily made using easily acquired parts.

I am not an expert, but I know a guy who is, he built his own Fluxgate detector, and it enabled him to get many an advanced tip off on impending aurora.

Ron.

[Ant]

I think that it really is the luck of the draw. Even on days where Aurora is expected you end up seeing nothing.

I was luck enough to see aurora twice on my life, both from south Essex (51.5N). It is worth the effort. The first lot was red/purple in colour (not to the eye, to the eye it was white only) - my avatar shows what it looked like...

The second was again white to the eye, but green on film...

Good luck, but as the others have said, you may have an easier , more fruitfull time is you leave it a few years till nearer solar maximum.

Ant

[Sam]

You could make your own magnetometer. The device detects changes in the earths magnetic field, caused Coronal Mass Ejections. This is usually a precurser to the Northern Lights. There are two types of detector. A fluxgate magnetometer, this usually requires a pen recorder to be effective. Or a bell jar model, this is a simple device which is easily made using easily acquired parts.

I am not an expert, but I know a guy who is, he built his own Fluxgate detector, and it enabled him to get many an advanced tip off on impending aurora.

Ron.

Thanks Ron, your post inspired me to build one with the kids after dinner last night. We made it pretty quickly out of a fizzy bottle, magnetised needle, wire, cotton and tape and have been watching it all day - hasn't moved though except for a very tiny bit. The kids think it's great and worked out it can detect the presence of the screw driver out to 25cm.

cheers

Sam

[Robd]

I agree with the various comments that it is the luck of the draw.

We have been on two trips in the hope of seeing the aurora ( see our website for pictures etc. ). The first in October 2001? ) was a great, if tiring, experience. We were stood out on the landing strip at the resort ( Alaska) at temperatures of 30 below. Most of us had problems with cameras, anything with a battery just died. We did see aurora, but it came and went very quickly.

The second occasion we took a long weekend in Iceland. On the Saturday we went up into the hills for a lobster dinner with the possibility of seeing aurora afterwards. Thick cloud when we went up ( we had started the day in a blizzard ). Somebody popped out to check the sky and came back to report some strange green glow. We settled the bill and headed away from the village. Absolutely stunning - see images on web site, and also on our friend Steve's at http://www.liv.ac.uk/~sdb/Aurora/index.html

Tried again the following night but yet another blizzard.

If my memory serves me correctly the aurora show follows the suns cycle so you get a peak every 11 years. Also the equinox is the peak each year, hence The October and March trips.