OT: The beautiful Aurora of May 10, 2024

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 (more imagery below the text)

On May 10, 2024, the strongest Solar storm in 20 years hit Earth. As a result, Aurora borealis (Northen Lights) was visible at much lower latitides than normally, including the Netherlands, where it put on a splendid, bright, colorful display between midnight and 1 am of the night of May 10-11.

Looking at the geomagnetic data just before nightfall on the 10th, I knew we had good chances of an impressive display. It had been a sunny day, the sky was clear, albeit with some cirrus. 

I bicycled 30 minutes to get to the Vlietlanden, a recreational area between Leiden and Leidschendam, to a spot on the shore of a lake where I often row, at approximately 52.107 N, 4.453 W.situated a few km out of town, it is darker there than in Leiden center and with a good view to low on the western, northern and eastern horizon. I arrived in deep twilight, set up the camera, and waited. Around 22:50 local time (20:50 UTC, May 10), still deep in twilight, some red streamers appeared near the moon in the west. I shot a few pictures with the 17 mm, then changed the lens to a Samyang f3.5/8 mm semi-fisheye as I had good previous experiences with that lens when photographich Aurora in Finland in 2013.

For about an hour, it remained quiet after that short period of activity. I decided to wait, knowing how activity can wax and wane repeatedly over a night. 

Around local midnight, a diffuse green band started to appear low in the north. Initially I was not sure whether it was aurora or light pollution: but when some drapery-like structure appeared in it and an aircraft contrail created a dark silhouet against it, I knew it was aurora. 

Soon, the glow became brighter, and photographically, purple streamers started to appear above it .And then, at about 00:10 local time, the sky exploded. Bright pillars or light appeared, changing shape and location, with blue, purple and red colors. They started to appear everywhere, west, north and east, reaching to the zenith and soon beyond. 

I started to cheer in excitement when the Corona took shape, just south of the zenith. I had seen it in Finland in 2013, and once in the Netherlands, in 1989. 

This aurora appearance was better than what I had seen in 1989 and 1990 (two years with exceptionally bright aurora in the Netherlands), and almost on par with what I had seen in Finland in 2013. For an hour, I was frantically taking pictures, as the sky seemd to change each 10 seconds. Then, at about 1 am local time, activity subsided, to a diffuse glow in the north. I stayed untill slightly after 1:30 am, then quit and went home.

Above and below, is a selection of images out of hundreds I took. They were made with a Canon EOS 80D and Samyang f3.5/8 mm lens, at ISO 800-1000 and exposured between 2 and 5 seconds. Photographically, the colors are more vibrant than what you see visually, but visually I also noted greenish, red and blue-purple colors.

(click the images below to enlarge them)

 

(this one taken with a 17 mm lens)

(looking straight up to the zenith)

PANSTARRS and Polar Light - Finland, March 2013

From 17 to 24 March I was in Finland, having fun in the snow at the Arctic circle. We stayed at Basecamp Oulanka at Juumajärvi, 66.26 N, from where we did snowshoe hikes, a husky sled tour, some cross-country skiing, and a trip to a world-famous bird shelter in order to see the Golden Eagle.

Of course, when going to the Arctic circle you hope for Aurora Borealis - the Northern Lights. I had seen Northern Lights before, from the Netherlands (where it is rare but on occasion can be seen), and it was stunning. So my hopes were high for an even better Arctic display. In addition, comet PANSTARRS was slowly moving out of the solar glare around that time. My secret mission: to get an image of the comet with Northern lights.

Mission accomplished, on the very first evening:

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The photograph is a stitch of two images made with the EOS 60D and a Tamron 17-50mm at 17mm. It was made in late evening twilight of March 17th, the start of an evening with incredible Northern Lights. An M1-class solar flare on the 15th resulted in an earth-directed CME which arrived at the 17th - our first evening in Finland. The result: astonishing Aurora all over the sky, with two especially intense periods between 20-21h local time and around local midnight. The first peak was very colorfull, with a.o. deep purples in addition to green. During the second peak near midnight, it was mostly green Aurora It was very lively, significantly changing on sub-second scales. Rays, dancing curtains, multiple corona's, it was all visible. Seeing Northern Lights in Orion was quite special too.

This all with friendly temperatures of -25 C... As I repeatedly worked the camera with my gloves off, my fingers got numbed, resulting in some images later that night where the camera had moved during exposure, because I hadn't thightened the clampscrews of the tripod head enough. I also used one of my woolen gloves to put the Aputure timer in, as the batteries suffered from the cold. The camera itself help up remarkably well though.

During the first peak I took pictures from the nearby lake Juuma: during the second peak I photographed from the basecamp itself, using the wooden chalets to create some scenic foregrounds. Lenses used were a SamYang 3.5/8mm semi fish-eye, and the 17-50mm Tamron. Here are some pictures (exposures range from 2 to 10 seconds:

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I took a number of series for a time lapse, resulting in this movie (put it on HD and full-screen: it is 1200x800 pixels):


As it turned out, that night was the only night with aurora that week - but what a splendid show it was! The local Fin people claimed it was the best show of the season.

The next evening, I targetted comet 2011 L4 PANSTARRS in evening twilight, using the Zeiss 2.8/180mm. The following image is a stack of 9 images of 1s each, taken from an unguided stationary tripod:

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Just before leaving for Finalnd, I already had some views of the comet from (near) my home town Leiden in the Netherlands as well. This image was shot on March 12th from the Cronesteyn polder just east of Leiden:

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After I returned from Finland, I took a last picture of the comet in the evening of April 2nd, when it was close to M31, the Andromeda Galaxy. This image is a stack of 21 images of 1s each taken with a SamYang 1.4/85mm at F2.8. I had to do quite some image processing, as the images were suffering from light pollution:

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