December 13/14, 2006

[BethKatz17582]

I think all of the pictures I'm including here are not aurora but light reflected off clouds except for a little green on the horizon behind the house in the first photo. But those of us who rarely get to see aurora and really, really, really want to see it might be fooled. All of these were from early hours of 2006 December 15 from south central Pennsylvania. Theoretically conditions were favorable for aurora with south Bz and 8 Kp, but we had intermittent fog and some clouds.

In the first photo, my kids and I both had a strong perception of red off these clouds. But that doesn't show here. There does seem to be legitimate aurora green on the far horizon. 2:03UT

In the second photo, Orion appears to be resting on an aurora bed. However, I believe these are clouds illuminated by the lights from the school. I *have* seen aurora in this southeast direction during a storm, but I'm doubting this one. 2:12UT

In the third photo, you see the school and the lights doing a very good job illuminating the clouds. What's surprising here is that there's so much light pollution but you still see the stars. I think the bright one above the tree is Sirius. 2:58UT

In the fourth photo, this looks very red, but the school is at lower left behind the trees. 3:02UT

[tornadochaser]

Last night Northern Colorado had a nice show at 6-6:30pm mst with some beams shooting out, colors were green, pink, purple, and then after 7 pm went to just a green arc.  The early show was the best I have ever seen in Colorado.
The green arc was very good, but the shooting beams was something I haven't seen here before.  Nice show, clear skies was a real surprise as it was suppose to be clouded in.  Hope for more to come.
Tim   

[Skyfan]

Hi Beth-
Thanks for sharing your photos. I saw much the same from my yard in southern Wisconsin that night. You summed up my doubts so well. When the conditions are as ripe as they were, I worry I may be seeing what I want to see. With the low clouds we had, I wondered about the red. With Madison to my north, it's tricky. As the red also extended quite far both east and west, and I've never seen red that deep before, I'm chalking it up to at least a bit of aurora. I feel better knowing someone of your experience with sky watching has the same difficulty. Here's hoping we have a chance to see something definitive in the not too distant future.

[dpanderson]

I know I am a little late to this party, but I just discovered this forum.  For a movie of the aurora from central Iowa on Dec 14, check out:
http://www.shoestringastronomy.com/aurora/images/Aurora2.wmv

Doug Anderson
Shoestring Astronomy
www.ShoestringAstronomy.com

[BlueBrained]

I know I am a little late to this party, but I just discovered this forum.  For a movie of the aurora from central Iowa on Dec 14, check out:
http://www.shoestringastronomy.com/aurora/images/Aurora2.wmv

Doug Anderson
Shoestring Astronomy
www.ShoestringAstronomy.com

Thanks for sharing the vid!!!

Excellent!

[auroradude]

Way cool video dude! I had to watch it a dozen times the first time. I love the east west motion of the diffuse aurora above. How many minutes are compressed here?
Thanks for sharing.

[Jeff VE6EFR]

Interesting video. Thanks for the link!

[dpanderson]

Each frame is a 15 second exposure, total length is about 12 minutes.  The movie then runs at 8 frames per second, so that is a 120:1 compression in time.  The photos we stitched together with Windows Movie Maker, which anyone with Windows XP service pack 2 should have.  It is incredibly easy to do this, I encourage you all to try.

[dpanderson]

P.S. If you look closely, you can see the Big Dipper above the horizon and watch it move as the Earth turns through the sequence.  You may have to maximize your viewer to see this.