'Best ever' auroras seen over Britain thanks to huge solar flares

The northern lights were seen brilliantly over large parts of the uk monday as the recent solar flares, caused by a sunspot known as 'Active Region 1302' buffeted the earth.

A sunspot 62,000 miles across - ten times bigger than Earth - is releasing gigantic solar flares that have created astonishing light shows over Britain, described by one sky-watcher as the best he'd ever seen. Known as auroras, they are caused by radiation particles from the sun bouncing off Earth's atmosphere and are normally only seen in countries in the far north, such as Norway. However, they've been photographed as far south as Oxfordshire and in Northumberland, where the skies became a dramatic green and purple hue.

This picture was taken in Northumberland.

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Scandinavia had some very intense auroras also. Stunning even seasoned northern light observers.

A coronal mass ejection (CME) hit Earth's magnetic field around noon Universal Time on Sept. 26th. The impact set the stage for a night to remember. As soon as darkness fell over Scandinavia, auroras filled the sky with such intensity that they were visible through rain clouds. Fredrik Broms photographed the scene from Kvaløya, Norway. "These were some of the most amazing auroras I have ever seen," says Broms, a longtime observer of the Arctic lights. "The colours were absolutely stunning with purple and deep blood-red in addition to the green. It was a night I will never forget!

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I have always wanted to see the northern lights in the uk. But I am probably too far south to ever see them from Devon, did anyone here get a good view of the recent light show in the uk?

Beautiful pictures!

Last night in Alberta, Canada, we also had quite the show. (Sorry no pictures)

I wonder what other light shows sunspot 1302 will give us?

Beautiful! Thanks for posting. Wish I could have seen it in person.

WOW awesome pictures... Thank You

Edit: Try this one instead astronomynorth.com...#

This link provides images coming from Yellowknife (North-Central Canada) Quite the show.

I've seen a couple the past few days (I'm south not far from the border) but it was not even close as what some lucky people saw.

Awesome pictures.

Anyone else noticed the resembelence between these photos and ones from outer space?

Pred...

It is a result in terms of knowledge . We saw it was going to be here in advance , and here is evidence of what we saw . Simple , but important.

The pictures speak for themselves , most unusual too . Enough has been said about the 'surrounding' circumstances .

Breathtaking photos! Someone should take some truly high deff video next time also. I have had one chance to see mufti colored northern lights once myself as I walked home (home was like in the center of 40 Sq miles of state land back then) from a friends house. They are amazing!!

West-central Saskatchewan here. One of the best shows I've seen since 1978. I stayed outside & watched until after 1 a.m. There maybe remnants of that show again tonight, but not quite as severe. I was quite taken by the speed of the lights last night and quiet violence of it all.

so if people are saying that these were the brightest northern lights they have seen in a long time, and the sunspot that it going on, any possibility of the sunspot being a result of the magnetic pull of alignments that are occurring?