Geomagnetic storms brought the northern lights to much of the U.S. on Tuesday night, painting the sky in vibrant hues of green and pink.
The Aurora Borealis was spotted in a large swath of states, including Idaho, Iowa, Missouri, New Mexico, New York, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas and Washington state. Northern lights were visible as far south as parts of Florida and Alabama, a relatively rare occurrence that highlights the severity of this week’s storms.
“Well, we had activity tonight — a lot of geomagnetic storm activity,” Shawn Dahl, service coordinator at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) Space Weather Prediction Center, said in a video on X.
A geomagnetic storm happens when charged particles from the sun’s atmosphere interact with the Earth’s magnetic field. In addition to creating dazzling displays of color, such storms can disrupt technology on Earth, from satellites and GPS to radio communications and the power grid.
Tuesday’s activity was the result of a phenomenon called coronal mass ejections (CMEs), massive blasts of plasma and magnetic field from the sun’s outer atmosphere that grow in size as they hurtle towards Earth.
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