NEW ORLEANS — After a dazzling light show across some unexpected places like the Gulf Coast on Friday night, the Northern Lights were not as apparent across Southeast Louisiana and South Mississippi on Saturday night. WWL Meteorologist Alexa Trischler took a drive to the Northshore away from city lights east of Mandeville and could not see any hints of the Northern Lights last night.
There are two reasons why this may not have been able to be seen so easily on Saturday night: more clouds moved in last night and it's also a possibility that the Aurora Borealis was not strong enough to reach this far south. However, if you happen to have any photos of the Northern Lights from Saturday night across the local area, please send them in!
Could we see the Northern Lights locally on Sunday night?
It's possible, but it does not look very likely because there will be a lot of cloud cover and even some rain and thunderstorms moving across the Northshore. Also, the active sunspot (NOAA Sunspot Region 3664) that's releasing these coronal mass ejections that are hurtling towards Earth causing the significant geomagnetic storms this weekend, is going to start rotating out of view from Earth by Tuesday. However, a G4 Watch or Greater from the NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center remains in effect, meaning historic geomagnetic storming is expected to continue through Sunday.
Overall, it does not look very promising that Southeast Louisiana and South Mississippi will get such fantastic views again tonight or tomorrow night that were seen on Friday night because of expected clouds and thunderstorms tonight and Monday night.
Why was the aurora so prominent across the Deep South on Friday night?
Since the geomagnetic storm was so intense (a level G5 which is the highest level) it was able to spread so far south across the country. When the NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center issued the G4 Storm Watch on Thursday, they mentioned that the spectacular sights could stretch as far south as Alabama. When the geomagnetic storm turned out to be a G5 level, the aurora was much more powerful and traveled as far south as Florida. Plus, skies were clear across the region on Friday night!
G5s are rare, it's been nearly 20 years since something like this has happened. With it being such a significant event, people across much of the United States could knock something off their bucket list...and possibly save a few dollars in plane tickets since the Northern Lights came right to their doorstep. Interestingly, the sun is going into a solar maximum which means more rare events like this may be possible, but time will tell.
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