Dec. 6, 2018:  A large hole in the sun’s atmosphere is facing Earth and spewing a stream of solar wind in our direction. NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory is monitoring the structure, shown here in a false-color UV image taken on Dec. 6th:

The hole (technical term: “coronal hole”) is so large it almost completely bisects the solar disk, stretching more than a million km across the sun’s equator.

We’ve seen this coronal hole before. It has been spinning around with the sun, lashing Earth with solar wind approximately once a month since September. Last month, the lashing commenced on Nov. 9th, lasted for almost 3 days, and caused sharp tremors in the geomagnetic field. Solar winds blowing faster than 600 km/s sparked an explosion of Phoenix-shaped auroras over Norway:

“The display over Senja, Norway, on Nov. 11th was nothing short of magical,” recalls photographer Adrien Mauduit. “Huge colorful pillars took the shape of a fiery bird.”

The same stream of solar wind will return on Dec. 8th or 9th and it may be even more potent this time because the underlying coronal hole has hrown larger in the intervening month. Arctic sky watchers, mark your calendars and warm your cameras. The Phoenix might rise again. Free: Aurora Alerts.

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ZEN ASTRONAUT: Are the holidays stressing you out? Get your zen from the edge of space. On Dec. 2, 2018, the students of Earth to Sky Calculus launched a cosmic ray balloon to the stratosphere. This meditating spaceman pendant went along for the ride:

The students are selling the pendants to support their ballooning program. You can have one for $129.95. They make great gifts for space fans and are guaranteed to soothe holiday stress. Each premium stainless steel pendant comes with a greeting card showing the astronaut in flight and telling the story of its journey to the edge of space and back again.

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Oct. 10, 2018: On Oct. 7th, a solar wind stream hit Earth’s magnetic field, sparking a G1-class geomagnetic storm. In southern Finland, the night sky turned green as energetic particles rained down on the upper atmosphere. But there was more to the show than beautiful lights.

“The storm also produced a number of distinctive sounds including crackles and claps,” reports Prof. Emeritus Unto K. Laine of Finland’s Aalto University. “Here is a recording of one of the strongest sounds of the night–a sharp clap.” Click to listen:

“I recorded this in the vicinity of Fiskars village after midnight local time,” he says.

Auroral sounds are controversial. Over the centuries, there have been many reports of strange sounds under the Northern Lights. However, researchers have struggled to explain the phenomenon and sometimes suggested that they might be imaginary. Laine is a believer: “We have been recording sounds like these for almost 20 years as part of the Auroral Acoustics Project.” More samples may be found here.

Laine has developed arrays of microphones that can pinpoint the sounds through triangulation. He finds that they occur about 70 meters above the ground. Temperature inversion layers at that altitude can cause a separation of + and – charges in the air. During some geomagnetic storms, the charge separation breaks down, causing air to move and a faint “clap” to be heard.

Think of it as geomagnetic thunder.

A spectral analysis of the “thunderclap” (above) shows dominant frequencies between 1 kHz and 2 kHz, squarely in the range of human hearing. You have to be quiet to hear them, though.

“People who talk and walk around, concentrating on picture taking, might never hear a single sound related to aurora,” says Laine. “You have to stop all other activities and focus on listening. We Finns are probably good at this because we have received more than 300 reports of sound observations during the Auroral Acoustics Project.”

Over the years, Laine has learned that a geomagnetic storm, by itself, is not enough to produce these thunderclaps. “A strong inversion layer is also required,” he says. “The inversion layer acts like an electrostatic loudspeaker. Without it there are no sounds.” This explains why many geomagnetic storms are silent. The local weather has to be just right — as it was on Oct. 7th.

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Sept. 14, 2018: The northern autumnal equinox is only a week away. That means one thing: Cracks are opening in Earth’s magnetic field. Researchers have long known that during weeks around equinoxes fissures form in Earth’s magnetosphere. Solar wind can pour through the gaps to fuel bright displays of Northern Lights. Here’s an example from Yellowknife, Canada:

“On Sept. 5-6, we could see auroras in the sky all night long, with a bright outburst of pink shortly after midnight,” says photographer Yuichi Takasaka.

During the display, a weak stream of solar wind was blowing around Earth. At this time of year, that’s all it takes. Even a gentle gust can breach our planet’s magnetic defenses.

This is called the the “Russell-McPherron effect,” named after the researchers who first explained it. The cracks are opened by the solar wind itself. South-pointing magnetic fields inside the solar wind oppose Earth’s north-pointing magnetic field. North and South partially cancel one another, opening a crack. This cancellation can happen at any time of year, but it happens with greatest effect around the equinoxes. Indeed, a 75-year study shows that September is one of the most geomagnetically active months of the year–a direct result of “equinox cracks.”

NASA and European spacecraft have been detecting these cracks for years. Small ones are about the size of California, and many are wider than the entire planet. There’s no danger to people on Earth. Our planet’s atmosphere intercepts the rush of incoming particles with no harm done and a beautiful afterglow.

Stay tuned for more Arctic lights as autumn approaches.

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Aug. 26, 2018: Last night, a crack opened in Earth’s magnetic field. Solar wind poured in to fuel a strong G3-class geomagnetic storm. John McKinnon photographed the storm’s brilliant green glow from Four Mile Lake in Alberta, Canada:

“At 2 o’clock in the morning, the auroras were so bright I could see them through the glare of the full Moon,” he says.

At the peak of the storm, Northern Lights spilled across the Canadian border into US states such as Michigan, New York, Montana, Wisconsin, and Indiana.  People in Alaska witnessed a fine display as well. At the same time, Southern Lights were photographed from several locations in New Zealand.

Forecasters did not see this coming. The stage was set for the storm when a minor CME arrived with little fanfare about 24 hours ago. First contact with the CME barely registered in solar wind data, and Earth’s magnetic field was unperturbed. The action began only after Earth entered the CME’s wake, where strong south-pointing magnetic fields opened a crack in our planet’s magnetosphere. A surprise geomagnetic storm ensued.

Realtime Aurora Photo Gallery