Brenda,

What a Night!

If you were one of the people that were outside last night looking for thePersieds Meteor shower? Consider yourself rewarded!
You were treated to a show like no other. And I'm not even really talking about the Meteor shower to be honest with you, it was good, but the show got better. What I am talking about, was the spectacular and quite possibly for most folks, a once in a life time show of the Northern Lights. It was incredible!

At approximately 12:30 a.m on the morning of August the 12th, there was an indication of Auroral activity to the North. By 12:38 a.m the Sky was Exploding! Abbotsford residents (the fortunate ones) were treated to a spectical unmatched by any fireworks show. Great huge spires of light shot straight up into the sky, draping curtains hung, shards and shafts of light appeared and disappeared. Reaching higher and higher overhead. Until finally at around 1:00 a.m the entire Sky burst into an Auroral Blaze, Green, Red,Purple,Yellow,Orange and finally White!

The Northern Lights finally reaching their goal, created a Spectacular Corona or Crown, straight over head (Zenith). The Sky began to pulsate, rythmically, slowly like the wash of a radar screen, then suddenly like someone flipping a switch! Blasts of light shot across the sky in rapid rapid rapid succession, as if some one turned on a ghostly strobe light. Celestrial Flames licked the sky, dancing, growing brilliant then fading, then back again! One could compare it to a fire in their own fire place minus the crackle, but licking across the sky such as the flames lick up towards the flue of a chimney. It was FANTASTIC.

It had to be the most incredible show I have ever had the great fortune to see!

What was responsible for this spectacular show? The Sun would be the culprit of this celestrial event.

The Sun goes through cycles of high and low activity that repeat approximately every 11 years. The number of dark spots on the Sun (sunspots)marks this variation; as the number of sunspots increases, so does solar activity. Sunspots are sources of flares, the most violent events in the solar system. In a matter of minutes, a large flare releases a million times more energy than the largest earthquake.

What is an Aurora?

The northern lights, also called the aurora borealis, is electromagnetic radiation caused by electrons colliding with molecules in the ionosphere. This spectrum of electromagnetic radiation ranges from infrared to ultraviolet. The visible spectrum is dominated by white and green light produced by excited oxygen molecules and pink light emitted from nitrogen.

When the sun is active, it often produces mass ejections that interact with Earth's magnetic field. Electric currents begin to flow in the upper atmosphere, and these currents produce the aurora borealis, which occurs almost simultaneously around both the north and south poles.

Now this as an Amateur Astronomer is the kind of Light Pollution I like!! Bet you did too if your fortunate enough to see it!