Sun spot creates colorful skies for our northern neighbors
Reddish or greenish auroras could be visible in the night sky across the northern U.S. Friday, the result of solar flares five times the width of the Earth.
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A sunspot roughly five times as wide as the Earth erupted twice this week into a solar flare sending coronal mass ejections (CMEs) our way.
This storm will not directly harm people.
The first CME reached Earth Thursday night and the second is expected Friday night.
This is consistent with measurements from NOAA’s sensors Thursday night showing stronger geomagnetic readings in Boulder Colorado than sensors in Fredericksburg, Va. This X1.6 class flare is an intense one, but the streamers or reddish or greenish light you may have seen in aurora photos are not expected south of the Mason-Dixon Line.
We have seen some effects from previous geomagnetic storms of this size in the northern skies of central North Carolina.
The aurora is created when high-energy particles collide with neutral atoms in the upper atmosphere exciting them.
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