The Aurora borealis is a jaw-dropping natural wonder that attracts countless visitors to the far north. The result of electron collisions in the Earth’s atmosphere, auroral activity casts stunning sheets of multi-colored light into the sky above each pole. Small wonder that ancient Inuit myth supposed that auroras were spirits made light.
It’s hard to imagine that the surreal beauty of the Northern Lights is caused by something as relatively simple as gaseous particles from the Earth’s atmosphere slamming into charged particles from the sun’s atmosphere. The Northern Lights Centre explains that the unpredictable color combinations of the aurora – everything from green to blue to red – are due to specific combinations of atmospheric particles. Still, even with the knowledge that the Aurora borealis and its southern cousin, the Aurora australis, are entirely natural, seeing the play of unworldly light over the stark landscapes of Alaska or Norway is no less breathtaking.
As if the Northern Lights themselves were not beautiful enough, Norwegian cameraman Harald Albrigsten captured rare footage of a pod of humpback whales swimming below the lights along the coast of Norway. As The Daily Mail points out, autumn through early spring is the best period to spot the Aurora borealis; still Albrigsten’s pairing of two wonders of the natural world was a real stroke of luck.
The University of Alaska Geophysical Institute maintains a forecast of when and where to best view the Aurora borealis, for anyone interested in seeking their own brush with this haunting phenomenon.
Bring a camera and your best low-light lens, as the Northern Lights make their most impressive showing in the pitch dark.
If auroral activity looks this magnificent from earth, consider how it must appear from the blackness of space! Check out NASA astronaut Scott Kelly’s impressive view from the International Space Station to see the Aurora borealis as never before.
