Look up: Northern lights could be back for an encore above metro Atlanta
Turn your eyes to the northern skies, Atlanta. There is a good chance we could see the aurora borealis dance across the horizon again late Wednesday.
Many Georgians already caught a glimpse of a rare northern lights show Tuesday night. The atmospheric glow is typically seen only around the North and South poles, but a much larger swath of the country saw the display because of unusually strong solar storms that are sending outbursts of magnetically charged particles hurling toward Earth. The colors swirling across the night sky are produced as those particles clash with our atmosphere.
Social media reports of sightings poured in overnight Tuesday from across Georgia and even farther south. Peach State residents posted pink-sky photos from Paulding County to Roswell, and even south of Savannah.
The Fernbank Science Center posted a photo on Facebook taken from near downtown Decatur and said the lights were visible “even without a camera.”
It’s possible the northern lights will be seen again Wednesday as far south as Alabama, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Space Weather Prediction Center. But it all depends on how the solar storm’s magnetic field plays with the Earth’s own field and how the solar electrons interact with our atmosphere, experts say.
We won’t know how intense the show will be until the sun goes down, so pay attention to the sky once night falls.
Karisa Zdanky, astronomy program manager and astronomer at the Tellus Science Museum in Cartersville, suggests trying to catch a glimpse around midnight for the brightest and most vibrant views. But depending on the level of geomagnetic activity, the lights may be seen even a few hours earlier, according to NOAA’s prediction center.
If you can’t see the lights with your naked eye, which could well be the case this far south, try using your phone’s camera without the flash, Zdanky advises. A long exposure helps bring out the colors so they’re visible in photos.
Little to no clouds are expected Wednesday night, Channel 2 Action News meteorologist Brian Monahan said, so it should be great viewing weather if we’re lucky enough for an encore. Getting away from the city’s light pollution will enhance the view.
Exactly how far south the lights will shine depends on the strength of the sun’s outbursts.
In simple terms, the sun is “a gigantic ball” of gas that ”expels burps every now and then, and those burps energize the (Earth’s) atmosphere and cause colors,” said Stephen Ramsden, director of the Charlie Bates Solar Astronomy Project, a nonprofit based in Atlanta.
The stronger the outburst, the greater potential for the northern lights to be seen further south than usual — or further north if you’re in the southern hemisphere. It’s a rare occurrence that depends heavily on the sun’s 11-year activity cycle, which is now in its maximum stage, said Zdanky.
Since Sunday, there have been a series of outbursts as the sun’s magnetic field shifts at the peak of its cycle, Ramsden said.
The eruption that could bring Wednesday’s round of northern lights to metro Atlanta is an unusually strong one, potentially even reaching “severe” levels, according to NOAA’s prediction center. Tuesday’s also reached the severe category.
The Peach State has had “three treats of the northern lights” in recent memory, Monahan said. The first was in May 2024, then a few months later in October of that year, followed by Tuesday’s show.
The Southeast got another taste of the aurora borealis in 2011, when the lights were visible as far south as Alabama, Georgia and Tennessee, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution previously reported.
