Juliancolton

Lights cancel tonight. Gonna try for some Milky Way shots as long as I have my batteries charged.

How do these things always manage to hit in the late morning/early afternoon? It's even more uncanny than the weekend snowstorm rule. Ah well, doesn't look that great anyway.

Great shot eyewall, look forward to seeing some more. Clouded out here, and what I saw was nothing compared to the upper midwest and NNE, but I couldn't be happier even if I were Jim Cantore in the thundersnow. Full-halo CME this afternoon from the same active region, so maybe we can thread the needle on Wednesday night before the endless cloudiness commences.

That was amazing just now. Unlike anything I've seen down here. Huge naked eye pillars dancing around.

Particle density got mighty jumpy over the past few minutes. Would those spikes be enough for substorming or not really?

Man, camera sensor noise is just abominable in this heat/humidity.

Naked eye achieved for a couple minutes, first time in years. Not a bust.

Green horizon, pink pillars... all on camera of course.

Heads up.

I'll take my chances with a 725 km/s solar wind and -20 Bz any day of the week. It takes forever and a half to get dark this time of year. Reason #476 why winter is better than summer.

Unobstructed view to the north needed unless something crazy happens. Some of the Wing Kp model forecasts this afternoon had me entertaining the thought of coronas in NNE, but that ship has sailed I think.

Well, that deescalated quickly. The Ovation model still looks impressive despite the putrid IMF, so maybe it's not entirely a lost cause?

Well the solar wind is certainly primed. Things are heating up a couple hours later than in recent storming events, so maybe the Bz component won't give us as much grief this evening.

Big

Wow, that's freaking sweet. What I wouldn't give to experience something like that. I need to move north.

Noctilucents clouds > aurora? https://twitter.com/NWSSeattle/status/608232353488502785

Looks quite good to me. I would no doubt be out with my camera if not for the dense overcast.

That's why the surprise events are the best... the clouds don't have time to conspire against us.

The magnetic field is definitely still disturbed, and with solar wind velocities way high and a -Bz component, it wouldn't take much to trigger some more storming I don't think. Like eyewall said, though, it's a shot in the dark most of the time.

Thanks guys. Yep, right in my backyard near Millbrook around 2am. There was definitely color in the sky most of the night, but the strongest pillars/curtains were maybe like 15 minutes. Lots of folks in the Midwest say it was the best display in recent memory, and I believe it, but I just wish I was more prepared for it. The best auroras never happen when you track a CME for three days and set up your equipment hours in advance, but instead when you get a text at 12:45 am saying you need to get out whether your camera is charged or not...

Nice show last night... best pillar structures I've seen. I think something knocked the focus ring on my camera after I left, as most of my shots are all too far out of focus to be usable. Impressive colors though.

Cool VIIRS nighttime image showing the band of aurora over southern Canada this morning. A wider and less pronounced view: and IR from the same time, for reference:

Yup. f/2.4 and ISO 1250 for 15 seconds, unedited jpeg. I'd be happy to give you some suggestions if you decide to start looking into new gear, though in today's day any basic dslr and lens kit would probably produce some decent results.

Here's the "best" shot of the night, out of something like 400. Kind of a deeper shade of green than I'm used to... more in-line with what someone would use for St. Paddy's Day. Festive!

Well at least we weren't let down after eagerly anticipating a major event for 72 hours or something (that's happened enough this cycle. I had almost forgotten about this CME until the indices started going bonkers this morning.