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dramatic image have captured the moment stunning aurora displays unhorse up the night sky during the strongest geomagnetic storm in 21 years , which hit Earth over the weekend . The phenomenon occurred after several big solar violent storm crashed into our planet ’s atmosphere , farm dark-green and disconsolate hues in skies across the Northern Hemisphere as far south as Florida .
The last time dawning were seen this far south was October 2003 , when an extreme G5 tempest — the in high spirits category for geomagnetic storms — smashed into Earth .
Hannah Osborne, planet Earth and animals editor, was on the Viking Cruise ship Octantis on Lake Erie.
Live Science editors were able-bodied to fascinate the case . Hannah Osborne , major planet Earth and animals editor , was on the Viking Cruise ship Octantis on Lake Erie reporting on the piece of work on - instrument panel scientists are doing to appraise the health of the Great Lakes , when the solar storm dispatch .
Related:‘Extreme ' geomagnetic violent storm that painted Earth with dawning this weekend was the most knock-down in 20 years
" It was an unbelievable experience , " she said . " Staff on board were buzzing , saying they ’d never witness anything like it before . They turned off all the light and the whole sky just get off up and turn pink and dark-green . There were streaks everywhere you looked . "
Northern lights glow in the sky on May 11, 2024 in Hulunbuir, Inner Mongolia of China.
On the other side of the planet , editor - in - chiefAlexander McNamarasaw the celestial light show from southwest England , an region of the area fresh to such a spectacle .
This weekend ’s geomagnetic tempest , which also temporarily hand G5 storey , began at around midday ET on Friday and persisted until the former hours of Monday ( May 13 ) .
" This is an unusual and potentially historic event,“Clinton Wallace , director of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric ( NOAA ) Space Weather Prediction Center , said in a command .
The northern lights, a result of the solar storms from May 2024, are visible from Berga, near Barcelona, on the night of May 10 to 11, 2024, in Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain.
The vast geomagnetic storm rise from an tremendous macula called AR3664 , which is more than 15 prison term wider than Earth . Last week , it unleashed a flurry of solar flare , include at leastfive that launched coronal mint ejections ( CMEs ) , or cloud or plasma and radiotherapy at our major planet . These clouds then smashed into the magnetised battleground around Earth , temporarily weakening our protective carapace and enabling charged atom to excite accelerator pedal in the atmosphere , which created the stunning light shows witnessed this weekend .
The people of colour bring about in an aurora depend on which gases are excited by the corpuscle from the sun and how much energy is exchanged between them . Oxygen is responsible for the light-green and red-faced hues experience during the recent geomagnetic storm , while pink hues were due to either oxygen or nitrogen .
After the initial tempest , the sun continued to spit out solar flare , including more X - course of study flare — the strongest the sun is capable of producing . Some of these flares also launch CMEs but they were not directed toward Earth . The mammoth sunspot is now facing away from our satellite and is improbable to bomb us any further .
Kathryn Richer (left) and her friend Andrea gaze upon the Northern Lights at Chanticleer Point Lookout on the Columbia River Gorge in the early morning hours of May 11, 2024 in Latourell, Oregon.
Photos from this surpassing event can be seen below .
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Northern Lights (Aurora Borealis), colorful lights shift, are seen from Baldersnas Ingaro on the archipelago of Stockholm, Sweden on May 11, 2024.
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The northern lights fill the sky with green ribbons of electrical charged particles over the barn and pastures at Greaney’s Turkey Farm in Mercer, Maine on May 11, 2024.
Aurora borealis was seen over the county of Somerset in south west England.
Hannah Osborne captured this stunning image of the northern lights seen from Lake Erie on the Viking Octantis cruise ship.
Spectacular images have captured the moment stunning aurora displays lit up the night sky during the strongest geomagnetic storm in 21 years.
The immense geomagnetic storm originated from an enormous sunspot called AR3664, which is more than 15 times wider than Earth.
Hannah Osborne, planet Earth and animals editor, was on the Viking Cruise ship Octantis on Lake Erie.
