Starship Asterisk*

This photo beautifully captures a phase of the aurora I saw from New Hampshire (4N) the same night. To me it looked like a giant onion with the base on the northern horizon and the tip just south of the zenith. I spent 6 hours marveling at the sky and every hour or so the aurora morphed into something new: the onion, pillars, flashing blobs about 10 degrees in size, jump rope type waves of light with each end of the rope held on the east and west horizons with each wave only taking a second to two to rise from the northern horizon to the zenith. It was amazing!

[quote="APOD Robot" post_id=339197 time=1716177992 user_id=128559]
and processed to heighten the colors and remove electrical wires.
[/quote]

But I can still see those wires!

[quote=TedH post_id=339201 time=1716207595 user_id=147946]
The position of the North Star seems low. I'm in Brookfield, Wisconsin, which is south of Arlington, and Polaris is never that low in the sky.
[/quote]

A wide angle image like this is strongly distorted. You can't compare what it shows to what your eye sees.

The position of the North Star seems low. I'm in Brookfield, Wisconsin, which is south of Arlington, and Polaris is never that low in the sky.

[url=https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap240520.html] [img]https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/calendar/S_240520.jpg[/img] [size=150]Aurora Dome Sky[/size][/url]

[b] Explanation: [/b] It seemed like night, but part of the sky glowed purple. It was the now famous night of May 10, 2024, when [url=https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.431368006258449&type=3]people over much of the world reported beautiful aurora-filled skies[/url]. The featured image was captured this night during early morning hours from [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arlington,_Wisconsin]Arlington[/url], [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wisconsin]Wisconsin[/url], [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States]USA[/url]. The panorama is a composite of several 6-second exposures covering two thirds of the visible sky, with [url=https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap240518.html]north[/url] in the center, and processed to heighten the colors and remove electrical wires. The photographer (in the foreground) reported that the [url=https://spaceplace.nasa.gov/aurora/en/]aurora[/url] appeared to flow from a point overhead but illuminated the sky only toward the [url=https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap200212.html]north[/url]. The aurora's energetic particles originated from [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coronal_mass_ejection]CME[/url]s [url=https://i.pinimg.com/736x/77/30/f7/7730f7bb82f011c58c53b31793ba3c51.jpg]ejected[/url] from our Sun over sunspot [url=https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap240513.html]AR 6443[/url] a few days before. This [url=https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap240511.html]large active region[/url] rotated to the far side of the Sun last week, but [url=https://science.nasa.gov/get-involved/citizen-science/be-a-solar-active-region-spotter/]may well survive[/url] to rotate back toward the [url=https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap220227.html]Earth[/url] next week.


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