Northern Lights Alert: How to stay alert when the sky is burning above your house?

As our Sun approaches the peak of its Cycle 25 activity, your chances of seeing the Northern Lights light up our skies are increasing. You missed the most recent storm of its kind, the weekend of November 4 and 5, 2023. But you’re determined not to miss the next storm. So since then you camp out in your garden every night. Of course, without closing your eyes. And it’s starting to get difficult…

Stay informed about the arrival of the Northern Lights

Know that there are other solutions to give yourself the best chance of living this amazing experience of seeing the spectacle offered by the Northern Lights. Many websites offer to follow our Sun’s activity and the resulting space weather – some in almost real time.

In this case, nothing is certain, but some clues increase, sometimes skyrocketing, the chances that the northern lights will shine in our sky. When what researchers call the K index – or KP index – exceeds the threshold of 5 on a scale down to 9, you have to go to higher latitudes to hope to enjoy the spectacle. And when the G index on the scale exceeds 2 it goes up to 5.

Northern lights forecast in Europe

There are some official services that provide their forecasts and help us see things more clearly.

This much weather office, The British National Meteorological Service has devoted a page of its website to this question. There we find forecasts of the Northern Lights in our Northern Hemisphere, but also in the Southern Hemisphere. ReasonFormerly Twitter, Dedicated presents its information in a perhaps slightly more graphic manner.

Service space weather The European Space Agency (ESA) provides very detailed information on the current situation. To access solar storm and aurora borealis forecasts, simply create a free account. but esa space weather there is definitely one Reason On which you can easily follow space weather news.

Also in the United States, we are interested in the Northern Lights

On the other side of the Atlantic, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) also publishes its forecasts and alerts “Geomagnetic storm” on its website and Reason,

Website space weatherFor its part, offers all kinds of information on the activity of the Sun and geomagnetic storms on its home page. Everyone is trying to make it accessible to the general public. Space weather and Aurora Borealis forecasts are also accessible Via SMS alert. But this service costs money.