David's Astronomy Pages (All Sky Camera) Aurora on night 2023-03-23 / 2023-03-24

Aurora  2023-03-14

Aurora Page

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Contrail 2023-03-27

Aurora

Notes

Night Summary (Keogram) Plot Pictures Videos More Pictures (AllSky View & Diff Frames) Magnetometer Stack Plots (for reference) Planetary K-Index Plot (for reference) Aurora Forecast, NOAA/Ovation (for reference)

- Major aurora activity visible from NE Scotland on the night of 2023-03-23 / 2023-03-24, beginning at or before 20:14 UT, with last activity at around 04:10 UT when it started to rain. Cloud affected the viewing at various times, but the peak (brightest) activity seems to have been at 20:50-21:00, 23:30 - 01:30 & 03:20 UT, but still very active in between.   - Scandinavia magnetometers indicate activity through the whole night, with peaks of activity at 21:00 UT, 23:30, 00:20, 01:00 UT & 03:20 UT      - KP Index 7  / GP3 level geomagnetic storm, shown by K-Index Plots

Night Summary (Keogram) Plot

Night Summary Plot - North Sky (2023-03-23 / 2023-03-24 ) Times on plot are local times (GMT = UTC +00h ) Activity visible on keogram through entire night, partly hidden by cloud, with peaks (brightest) activity at 20:50, 23:00 - 00:15 & 03:20 UT

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Pictures

Panoramic View - Northern Sky

2023-03-23 20:18 UT First indications of aurora activity around 19:50 in twilight sky, but first prominant rays appearing at 20:16 to 20:18  reaching to 40 deg altitude. Auroral arc largely hidden by cloud.

2023-03-23 20:50 UT Brightening and raising of auroral arc to 20-25 deg altitude

2023-03-23 20:54 UT Bright aural arc. Bright rays in NE sky tilting eastwards to 40- 50 deg altitude. Lower arc hidden by foreground cloud

2023-03-23 21:19 UT Auroral activity continuing, partly hidden by foreground clous

2023-03-23 21:51 UT Clearly of sky. Very bright broad auroral arc to 20 deg altitude & biased toward west , with diffuse rays to 35+ deg altitude

2023-03-23 21:59 UT More symmetrical auroral arc to 18 deg, possible curtains starting to develop ?. More prominant ray in NE Sky to 30 deg altitude. Unidentifed track in NNW sky at 36-37 altitude (not visible in immediately adjacent frames)

Original Image  (left) &  Image x7 (right)

2023-03-23 22:22 UT Aurora activity, bisymetrical arc, diffuse rays, some bands emanating  and heading towards zenith

2023-03-23 22:36 UT Aurora activity continuing again bands emanating  and heading towards zenith

2023-03-23 23:00 UT Aurora activity continuing again with diffuse rays and bands emanating and heading towards zenith

2023-03-23 23:26 UT Major brightening in activity evident that hidden in part by cloud, Auroral arc climbed to 30 deg altitude Corona stage believed to be reached at around 00:12 UT based on AllSky Image (see latersection)

2023-03-24 00:21 UT Auroral activity partially hidden by foregroundcloud. Diffuse rays to at least 50 deg altitude. Rays extending to western and eastern skies

2023-03-24 00:43 UT Activity somewhat decreasing in level (auroral arc descending) but beautiful picture with rays and curtains developed, with forground cloud patches.  Arc descended to 10 deg altitude but diffuse rays still to at least 30-35 deg altitude.

2023-03-24 01:10 UT Major brightening in auroral. Arc climing to 20-25 deg altitude again. Band pushed towards zenith.

2023-03-24 01:17 UT Prominant rays to 40-45 deg altutude, with band moving towards zenith

2023-03-24 01:28 UT Continuing intense, very bright activity. Rays to ad least 50-55 deg.

2023-03-24 02:02 UT Arc reducing to 20 deg altitude, but rays and banding still reached to 50 deg altitude.

2023-03-24 02:53 UT Aurora activity partly hidden by foreground cloud. Very bright ray in NNE sky reaching to 60+ deg altitude

2023-03-24 02:59 UT Aurora activitycontinuing to be significantly hidden by increasing foreground cloud. Bright ray in NNW-NW sky reaching to 50 deg altitude

2023-03-24 03:12 UT Brightening of aurora (either increase in activity or clearing in forground clouds).  Prominant rays in NW Sky

2023-03-24 03:19 UT Major brightening / increase in auroral activity. Rays to 60+ deg altitude

2023-03-24 03:28 UT Brightening auroral acivity increasing. Prominant rays in NE Sky to 55-60+ deg altitude Cloud re-developing again,

2023-03-24 03:51 UT Activity declining and significant covered by cloud, Aurora arc sitting at 15 deg altitude still

2023-03-24 04:00 UT Auroral activity largely hidden by cloud. Appears to still be present and probably declining?

2023-03-24 04:14 UT Auroral activity almost totally hidden, by cloud. Rain started at 04:10-04:15

30s exposures taken with Oculus All Sky Camera

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 Videos

Video of AllSky View

See also Video : AllSky view of same 8h 15 period, 17.9 MB

See also Video : AllSky view of same 8h 15 period (Difference Images), 26.0 MB.

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More Pictures

AllSky View - Selected frames from video Frames are 30s exposures taken with Oculus All Sky Camera     (Note: north is on the right hand side of pictures below)

2023-03-23 22:19 UT Activity along entire northern horizon. Diffuse rays

2023-03-23 22:54 UT Faint auroral light band passing through zenith

2023-03-23 23:31 UT Activity across entire northern sky but hidden in part by cloud, but patch/band of activity moving towards zenith

2023-03-24 00:12 UT Sign of corona stage , reaching past zenith at 00:12 UT. Best seen in the video

2023-03-24 00:30 UT Still in corona stage

2023-03-24 02:53 UT Prominant ray in NNE Sky

2023-03-24 03:18 UT Prominant rays across entire northern sky

2023-03-24 03:23 UT Prominant rays across entire northern sky, reaching to zenith

2023-03-24 03:32 UT Rays reaching to zenith

AllSky View - Selected frames from Difference Frame video Frames show difference between two consecutive 30s exposures taken with Oculus All Sky Camera

2023-03-23 20:14 UT 'Tsunami-like' feature heading southwards, believed to be part of the auroral display, the feature is considered to be different to aircraft contrail seen on 2023-03-28 ( definitive aircraft contrail observed on night 2023-03-27 / 2023-03-28 ) as there was no aircraft moving across sky when in appeared and the direction of movement (southwards) is opposite to direction that clouds were moving (northwards) and opposite to the general wind direction.

2023-03-23 22:49 UT

2023-03-23 23:35 UT

2023-03-24 00:00 UT

2023-03-24 00:09 UT

2023-03-24 01:11 UT

2023-03-24 03:17 UT

2023-03-24 03:24 UT

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Magnetometer Stack Plots (for reference)

Magnetometer Stack Plots from Scandinavia (ordered by latitude) H Component - 2023-03-14 / 2023-03-15 Original data from Tromsø Geophysical Observatory (TGO), DTU Space (Technical University of Denmark) and Finnish Meteorological Institute (FMI, displayed on SpaceWeatherLive http://www.spaceweatherlive.com/en/auroral-activity/magnetometers). Note: Geomagnetometer activity at rvk (Rorvik, 64.95N), dob (Dombas, 62.07N), sol (Solund, 61.08N) and kar (Karmoy, 59.21N) stations are used as indicators for potential auroral activity that may be visible from my Observatory situated at latitude 57.32N  (Map of Stations)

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Planetary K-Index Plot (for reference)

Estimated 3 hour Planetary K-Index (NOAA) (K indices of 5 or greater indicate storm-level geomagnetic activity around earth)  (from http://services.swpc.noaa.gov) planetary-k-index_2023-03-23 / 2023-03-24 TBA

Planetary K-Index and other information (Space Weather Prediction Centre) shows KP Index reaching KP7+ around midnight on 2023-03-23

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Aurora Forecast, NOAA/Ovation (for reference)

Aurora Forecast at 2023-03-23 21:00 UT for 21:47 UT (From Space Weather Prediction Centre,  http://www.swpc.noaa.gov )

Aurora Forecast at 2023-03-23 23:00 UT for 23:57 UT (From Space Weather Prediction Centre,  http://www.swpc.noaa.gov )

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