NEW ORLEANS — It's a natural phenomenon that happens so rarely. Thursday night there's a chance parts of Southeast Louisiana could see the Northern Lights.
They dance across the night sky – vibrant pinks and greens showcasing nature's beauty. The Northern Lights are simply magical.
Space weather forecaster, Shawn Dahl with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Space Weather Prediction Center said, "It's a blast of solar material, billions of tons of it in fact, and a strong magnetic field is dragging it out into space towards Earth, that's left the sun a few days ago and arrived at earth this morning at exactly 9:15 a.m."
The evening of October 10th isn't just any old Thursday evening, we could see a phenomenon in our own backyard. WWL Louisiana Meteorologist Peyton Malone says it's difficult for the lights to happen, that's what makes it so rare.
He said, "The northern lights are interesting because you get these charged particles that [have] traveled from the sun, they have raced our direction at a million miles an hour, that magnetic field is literally colliding with Earth's magnetic field and as those charged particles are coming into the atmosphere, they're excited that's why you get your colors."
Now don't get too excited, but space weather forecasters say there's not a huge chance we will see the lights, but there's still a possibility. "It's a magnetic storm, so it involves magnetism, so if you take two negative magnets and you try and put them together, they repel but if you have one opposite the other, they connect, magnets stick together. Same here with thing with the storm, we need that magnetic energy," Dahl said.
The experts say because of light pollution in the city, you will have to leave New Orleans to see the Northern Lights, you could head to St Tammany Parish in the Folsom area, you could also head to Washington Parish or parts of Tangipahoa Parish.
The key is to find the darkest parts of a rural area to see the lights. Remember to have your camera ready, because you may just be lucky enough to see nature's magical light display.
Dahl said the best time to see the lights is usually the hours surrounding midnight.
