First time Aurora hunter requesting guidance

[Gila Bear]

Hello, all, 

First time here, and I am humbled by all of your knowledge.  Years ago my kids expressed interest in seeing the aurora, and as I started researching it, I became more and more keen on this idea of finding a dark sky and a clear night and heading north.  Now, two years into a pandemic, I have enough cabin fever to consider getting in the car and road-tripping.  6 hours north of our home in the light-polluted northeast US is the dark sky park of Mount Megantic, in southern QC.  

Looking at the weather forecast, I see relatively clear skies on Saturday night.  I've pasted NOAA's 3-day geomagnetic forecast below. Translating to local, it looks like we have an anticipated Kp of 5, 4, 5, between the hours of 5pm Saturday EST and 1AM on Sunday morning.

I've been trying to follow this week's activity in your forum, and I understand that the very large and exciting CME was around the other side of the sun and probably won't directly result in visible Auroras.  However, I'm not sure I follow all of the terminology in the other discussions on the forum to feel ready to jump in. 

Anyway, would any of you super-knowledgeable folks out there advise me to hop in the car with my 13 year old son and take our chances (and at the very least, maybe get our passports stamped in Canada!) or is this a foolish endeavor?   Is there a shot of seeing the aurora from that far south, even with a Kp of 5, or would it just be low on the horizon still at this latitude?  I'm all for travel to Iceland, or better yet, Svalbard - though that's not happening anytime soon!  Thanks for any guidance you might share.  

[Vancanneyt Sander]

I wouldn’t go based on CH prediction. First of all space weather is hard to predict, often with CH the prediction is based on previous rotation and coronal holes change over time. Plus the arrival time of a CH or CME is no exact science and can be hours off so it’s better to wait till it arrives before you drive. And if it arrives, you’ll need to look at the conditions of the solar wind and IMF to know if a drive is worth it or not. 

[Sam Warfel]

4 hours ago, Gila Bear said:

Hello, all, 

First time here, and I am humbled by all of your knowledge.  Years ago my kids expressed interest in seeing the aurora, and as I started researching it, I became more and more keen on this idea of finding a dark sky and a clear night and heading north.  Now, two years into a pandemic, I have enough cabin fever to consider getting in the car and road-tripping.  6 hours north of our home in the light-polluted northeast US is the dark sky park of Mount Megantic, in southern QC.  

Looking at the weather forecast, I see relatively clear skies on Saturday night.  I've pasted NOAA's 3-day geomagnetic forecast below. Translating to local, it looks like we have an anticipated Kp of 5, 4, 5, between the hours of 5pm Saturday EST and 1AM on Sunday morning.

I've been trying to follow this week's activity in your forum, and I understand that the very large and exciting CME was around the other side of the sun and probably won't directly result in visible Auroras.  However, I'm not sure I follow all of the terminology in the other discussions on the forum to feel ready to jump in. 

Anyway, would any of you super-knowledgeable folks out there advise me to hop in the car with my 13 year old son and take our chances (and at the very least, maybe get our passports stamped in Canada!) or is this a foolish endeavor?   Is there a shot of seeing the aurora from that far south, even with a Kp of 5, or would it just be low on the horizon still at this latitude?  I'm all for travel to Iceland, or better yet, Svalbard - though that's not happening anytime soon!  Thanks for any guidance you might share.  

First, know that the forecast KP is the maximum value that forecasters think could happen, not what will be attained.  There's simply too much unknown with space weather, any event could turn out to be total dud with know knowledge of that beforehand. (It can also turn out be stronger, but that's rarer.)

Second, even if KP5 (G1) is attained, according to the images I found (one is attached) your location would be pretty far south for Aurora to be visible during a KP5 event.  Even in a dark sky park like yours (looks like a wonderful viewing location, other than southerlyness), I'd say seeing an Aurora would be pretty unlikely during KP5, and if it was, it would be extremely dim, perhaps only showing up in long-exposure photographs.  When Aurora are dim, the color is harder to see.
Summery, even if we get KP5, at your location this would probably not be much to see if anything was seeable at all.  Maybe not worth it to the kid.  You want KP6 or higher.

Thirdly, Auroras are erratic, and may only be visible for a very short time during a night or geomagnetic storm.  You may have to watch for many hours to avoid missing it (if there was an Aurora to see), make sure your son and you are on the same page about how dedicated to the hunt to be.

So long story short, probably not this time.  Don't be too deflated though, there will be many more (and much better) opportunities to come!  We are slowing ramping up to solar maximum during the next couple years, strong Geomagnetic storms will be more and more common!
In fact, a better chance may be quite soon if that sunspot that launched the CME you commented on keeps up it's activity as it faces Earth.  Fingers crossed.  If not, many more will follow.
My best advice is wait for something bigger, and in the meantime learn all you can about Auroras and space weather!  Reading the forums here is a great way to see what's exciting (and Aurora viewing opportunities), and read the help articles on SpaceWeatherLive, they have tons of useful information on how to interpret all the useful data plots found on the website.
Post if you have any questions!
Happy hunting!

 

2 minutes ago, Vancanneyt Sander said:

I wouldn’t go based on CH prediction. First of all space weather is hard to predict, often with CH the prediction is based on previous rotation and coronal holes change over time. Plus the arrival time of a CH or CME is no exact science and can be hours off so it’s better to wait till it arrives before you drive. And if it arrives, you’ll need to look at the conditions of the solar wind and IMF to know if a drive is worth it or not. 

Exactly, and with a 6-hour drive, they can't exactly wait and see and go out when it's only about 40-60 minutes for the solar wind to go from L1 (where our data is from) to Earth

Edited January 14, 2022 by Orneno

[Miss Sunshine]

I would go anyway, I think there will be aurora. 😅 Otherwise, roadtrip is fun. Thinking about doing something like that too, dont know where to go though. Live in Norrköping in sweden. Tell me how it turned out after! And if someone have any tips about places for me to go i would appriciate it. 

[Gila Bear]

Thank you, Vancanneyt Sander and Orneno, for the sage advice, and Miss Sunshine, for your sunshiny optimism!  As a newbie it is hard not to get excited about all the chatter about CMEs and various flares, etc. 

Miss Sunshine, it looks like you have the advantage of a location that is several hundred miles north latitude of ours, to start with, so a road trip might be more fruitful (aurora-ful) for you at this point.  

If we head north (though I doubt we will this weekend, based on the above advice), we will do it purely as an "exploratory" mission, and with lots of snacks good tunes for the car, and no/low expectations.  Either way, what an exercise in patience (and luck) this aurora-hunting will be, to be sure!

[Sam Warfel]

23 minutes ago, Gila Bear said:

Thank you, Vancanneyt Sander and Orneno, for the sage advice, and Miss Sunshine, for your sunshiny optimism!  As a newbie it is hard not to get excited about all the chatter about CMEs and various flares, etc. 

Miss Sunshine, it looks like you have the advantage of a location that is several hundred miles north latitude of ours, to start with, so a road trip might be more fruitful (aurora-ful) for you at this point.  

If we head north (though I doubt we will this weekend, based on the above advice), we will do it purely as an "exploratory" mission, and with lots of snacks good tunes for the car, and no/low expectations.  Either way, what an exercise in patience (and luck) this aurora-hunting will be, to be sure!

You’re welcome! 

[Solarflaretracker200]

50 minutes ago, Gila Bear said:

As a newbie it is hard not to get excited about all the chatter about CMEs and various flares, etc. 

I have been watching since Nov 2nd and still get excited over all of the chatter lol 

[Sam Warfel]

3 minutes ago, Solarflaretracker200 said:

I have been watching since Nov 2nd and still get excited over all of the chatter lol 

Same. @Gila Bear Pay attention to Vancanneyt Sander, he’s been doing it for a long time and is much better at not getting excited for no reason than us new people.  😂

[Solarflaretracker200]

We suck at not being excited 😂😂

[Sam Warfel]

Just now, Solarflaretracker200 said:

We suck at not being excited 😂😂

I know, this current activity is getting me excited even though it probably won’t last until night here, and it’s completely overcast anyway 😂

[Gila Bear]

So, we just keep watching the flares, and trust that Sander will let us know when it's time to hop in the car and DRIVE?  Sometimes the wording of these posts can be a little intimidating for a novice -  I don't want to miss the message when the big one is coming.😅

[Solarflaretracker200]

Just now, Gila Bear said:

  I don't want to miss the message when the big one is coming.😅

Same...the sun can do the unexpected things sometimes.... 😂

[Gila Bear]

1 minute ago, Orneno said:

I know, this current activity is getting me excited even though it probably won’t last until night here, and it’s completely overcast anyway 😂

And wouldn't today's activity not be visible until some period of time later, anyway?  Hours/days?  

[Solarflaretracker200]

1 minute ago, Solarflaretracker200 said:

Same...the sun can do the unexpected things sometimes.... 😂

For example... Firing off M- class solar flares when your asleep, missing them and so on lol

[Sam Warfel]

2 minutes ago, Gila Bear said:

So, we just keep watching the flares, and trust that Sander will let us know when it's time to hop in the car and DRIVE?  Sometimes the wording of these posts can be a little intimidating for a novice -  I don't want to miss the message when the big one is coming.😅

Yup! If there’s an event that is expected to be strong enough, you’d probably see it in the news too. 

[Solarflaretracker200]

And i will miss it 😂 (I hope not)

[Sam Warfel]

1 minute ago, Gila Bear said:

And wouldn't today's activity not be visible until some period of time later, anyway?  Hours/days?  

Today’s activity is visible now. Everything you see on the data plots is for about 40-50 minutes from now, that’s how long it takes the Solar wind to blow from our monitoring spacecraft to Earth. 
However, it won’t be strong enough to be visible far south, and shouldn’t last long enough for it to even get dark in North America anyway. 

[Cat Perkinton]

1 hour ago, Gila Bear said:

So, we just keep watching the flares, and trust that Sander will let us know when it's time to hop in the car and DRIVE?  Sometimes the wording of these posts can be a little intimidating for a novice -  I don't want to miss the message when the big one is coming.😅

That is the enigma of the aurora, you really have to be already in situ when the messages hit about the activity,  it can vary massively within 30 minute windows, so by the time you see that activity is going bonkers, it may be too late to set out. I have attached a shot from the 3rd Nov 2021, where I had to stop on route to my location of choice as I could see the pillars above my car headlights. Had I continued on for the extra 15 minutes to get to my favourite viewing spot, or waited for the alerts to go off before setting out, I would have missed this amazing display.  ( Central Scotland) 

[northeastlights]

@Gila Bear, it's great to see another chaser in New England! Incidentally I grew up in New Haven and I recommend the Moosehead region of Maine as a potential viewing site, you can usually find an inn and a gas station in Greenville while still being in truly dark Bortle 1 skies. You will also find yourself in an absolutely beautiful wilderness in the morning. 

Chasing the lights in New England is certainly possible, but as many have said already, you'll need a Kp 6 or 7 event for anything visible to show up. Bring a camera that can do long exposures to get a look at what you might not be seeing. My camera was able to see this during the November 3 2021 CME from Gloucester, MA, when activity got just over Kp 6, but only a few of the bright pillars were visible:

 

I also like to try and get a better sense of how noteworthy a solar storm is from the SWPC forecast discussion, where forecasters will sometimes comment on the level of confidence they have in the forecast. Aside from that, there's not much you can do besides setting yourself up in a clear, dark part fo the sky with minimal moonlight. What's most important is actually deciding to go when the conditions are good, since you will never get an accurate 6-hour warning for this kind of thing. Be ready for a lot of forecasts that don't produce auroras down here, but the first time you do see them it'll be 1000% worth it!

 

Edited January 18, 2022 by northeastlights

[Gila Bear]

@northeastlights, that's a beautiful picture - thank you for the encouragement, and the tip about Greenville, ME.  Nice to know you could catch something from as far south as Gloucester, because it is very true that I'd never have enough warning to get all the way to ME or QC if I'm not already planning to be up that far north.  I'll just keep on watching out for increased solar activity, and hope it coincides with a clear night (and is it too much to ask for temps above 0?  This past weekend was really a bit too chilly to be out for long, anyway.  

Thanks again!  Stay warm. ☀️