Auroral activity may return

Scott A. Kampas

Scott A. Kampas

EF4
Joined
Dec 10, 2003
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303
The show may begin within a couple hours:

Geomagnetic and Auroral Activity Update

The anticipated coronal mass ejection HAS ARRIVED. Impact with the Earth is expected anytime now. The IMF has turned northward with this event and therefore will (for the moment) not be capable of producing significant activity. However, a southward turning (negative Bz) is anticipated during this disturbance and should produce some decent auroral storm conditions. The disturbance arrived earlier than expected. It's higher than anticipated velocity will increase the potential volatility of the disturbance.
Click to expand...
http://www.spacew.com/
 
Oh my god. I can't believe something beat the November 2004 show. I didn't think I'd ever see something like that again in my whole life but tonight I did. Tonight beat that. Thanks for the heads up Scott! I wouldn't have followed it without the heads up. I got out there when the bz stayed south to see what she had and could see the white band as soon as I got out of town. Then right away big red beams, but they were so short-lived. The next hour+ wasn't very impressive at all and I thought about calling it a night but remembered what last time yeilded by staying out. I said screw it I'm sticking it out till I fall asleep. Then I got bored with my flat horizon location and thought about my folk's house. There was a TON of wild life noise out there on the flat bottoms. Some kind of bird was making a ton of noise in the fields as well as more of the same from others in different places. Not sure what they were. Add to that lots of frogs and other noise and it was just really noisey out there. Anyway I was scared to miss any peaks but decided to head out to my parents place. So I call them at 2:30 so they wouldn't wonder what was happening when the dogs started barking. Met my dad outside and quickly got onto the roof of the house as it was now going crazy. Shot some pics overlooking the town from up there. That got old so shot some of the flag then went higher up behind the house with an even better/higher view. Then the TORCH started. On the eastern and western sides there were really strong beams that were bright red going up to what would soon be the corona. I think I have a pretty cool pic of my dad looking up at the corona. It is just so freaky looking as it doesn't look real at all. Will have to get these pics online soon as they should beat the last aurora images. What a crazy long show. They just made you feel like you could jump out right into them. There were also several LONG shooting stars which of course I captured not a one of. Chase auroras is much like storms. The time you let up and give up something will happen. I wonder how big and rare of an event this one was. I bet you could see it in Cuba.
 
Got done shooting several video packages today and was pretty beat. First was the Mn Rain for TWC then a Flooding package for the TV Station when I was looking at data about the aurora event and Scott K sent me a I.M. saying it was going to be a big one. So I headed west to get out of the clouds and oh man was I glad I stayed up for this!!!

Anyways, right now I'm feeding video out and taking a break as the sun rises. Here is one of many photos. This was by far the best event ever and I was watching the Aurora to my "South" instead of the north. [Broken External Image]:http://www.lightningboy.com/blog/0505/DSC00494_051505t.jpg you can see the full size one on http://www.lightningboy.com
 
Special thanks to Kampas for waking me up to catch the show.

At 0330CDT
I stumbled out of bed, got quickly dressed, grabbed my camera (checked to make sure battery, flash card, and tripod mount were all in the bag) and walked out to the car. I saw a bright white/purple pillar right over my neighbor's house and this is town with street lights set on "Perma-Noon." My groggy anger from being awoken quickly disipated and was replaced with astonishment and a sense of urgency to get out of town to see what I could.

Luckily for me "the country" is only an 8 minute drive east, once i got out there I could see a massive purple curtain with a green base due east and going straight overhead. I decided beggars can't be choosers and that I would have to stop at the next intersection to get photos and watch it or else I'd miss the show. Unfortunately my location was plagued by light pollution in half the sky: very bad from due North to due West due to Urbana and distant Rantoul, and semi bad to my east due to St. Joseph/Ogden.

I fired off some photos and from what I've heard from Kampas, Pritchard, and seen in photos my show wasn't nearly as good as it had been. Oh well, at least I saw what I did ;) Enough semi-conscious rambling now with the photos:
http://www.dbphotoworld.net/photos/cil/05-15-05/

[Broken External Image]:http://www.dbphotoworld.net/photos/cil/05-15-05/images/IMG_5803.jpg
[Broken External Image]:http://www.dbphotoworld.net/photos/cil/05-15-05/images/IMG_5812.jpg
some aurora still visible in early twighlight due north and just east and west of due north along the horizon (faint green tint):
[Broken External Image]:http://www.dbphotoworld.net/photos/cil/05-15-05/images/IMG_5825.jpg
the twighlight grapped on my aurora.
[Broken External Image]:http://www.dbphotoworld.net/photos/cil/05-15-05/images/IMG_5842.jpg

After the peak ended right around 0400hrs CDT I relocated to a better spot a few miles north to meet with Pritchard who had been toughing it out all night, by the time I got there twilight became an obvious issue and it was clear our show was over.

hollingshead as always, amazing photos! I Predict your site will crash due to the traffic by tuesday :D
DougK: amazing photo.

for the photo nerds out there:
Camera: Canon D60 (struggles with aurora photos sometimes)
Lense: Canon EF 20mm 1:2.8
ISO 400 (probably too high of an iso for this but i was still waking up while taking photos)
Aperature: 2.8
Shutter Speed: Variable (bulb setting)
 
I'm curious about Norman or DFW...did anyone in either of these places see anything? I'll be so jealous if it was seen that far south! I've never seen the aurora in my life.

You guys have some awesome pictures, by the way!
 
Originally posted by Melissa Moon
I'm curious about Norman or DFW...did anyone in either of these places see anything? I'll be so jealous if it was seen that far south! I've never seen the aurora in my life.

You guys have some awesome pictures, by the way!
Click to expand...

http://www.spacew.com/www/auroras.php <-- a worldwide listing of aurora sightings, some in New Zealand saw the aurora.
 
Thanks for the link...I saw the site earlier and skimmed through the reports. I know there aren't any from DFW or Norman listed there at the present time, so I'm just curious what any ST members might have seen (if anything). It's possible that if conditions were clear, I'd have a chance of seeing a little bit of it in Melbourne right about now, but alas we have cloud cover at the moment :(. Bugger.
 
I went out to try looking for it, but I blew out a tire NE of town and never got far enough from the city lights to see it. :evil:
 
I went out to my backyard to try looking for it several times. I never saw anything and clouds started to move in around 3am so I gave up.
 
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