Last night I saw the most impressive aurora event I have ever seen, apparently the biggest solar in over 20 years is currently on going. Usually, when there is a Red Alert on the AuroraWatch UK website or app, and the sky isn’t clear and dark enough. Here in Edinburgh, you might get to see a faint green glow on the northern horizon, but not last night. Last night there were sheets of green, purple, and red lights across the whole sky.

I first came across AuroraWatch UK over 20 years ago, at that time it offered a text alert service, this was before the days of smartphones. One evening in the early part of this century, there was a text to say that a visible aurora was possible. A friend and I when out into Harrison Park to look at the sky, there were some faint green ripples across the sky, and we found that we needed to stand under a bridge over the canal to block out most of the street light to see it better. At the time, it felt magical. In those days, digital cameras were in their infancy and there was no social media, so the next day you just went into the office or met your friends in the pub to talk about what you had seen.

Now it is different, first the alert I got was on the AuroraWatch UK app and also one from AuroraNotifier. The first alert came during daylight hours and was unusual because it had gone straight from green (no activity) to red. Normally, you get a yellow or amber before it builds to red. The screenshot below shows the extent of the sightings across Northern Europe (as recorded on the app) as it got dark.

This is something else that is different to the way things were twenty years ago, back then, people didn’t feel the same pressure to go out and record their experience in real time and let the world know. Having said that, I would have probably written a blog post about it, if I had had a blog (I didn’t start this one until 2006), but it would have been so immediate. That night, in 2001, I did call friends other (using my Nokia phone, my first mobile phone) to ask them if they wanted to come out and see the natural spectacle, but they declined. Would they do so now?

Screenshot of the AuroraWatch UK app showing a series of red alerts going on for several hours

At first, I wasn’t expecting to see much, but Ulli wanted to go out into Holyrood Park and see if there was any chance of something. Sitting at home, I noticed an increasing number of social media posts of sightings, notably none from Edinburgh at that time. I also looked at a time-lapse video of Arthur’s Seat at sunset that I had recorded earlier, at the end of which there was a greenish glow to the sky.

 

So when Ulli messaged me with an image, I decided to go and join her.
View of Arthur's Seat, in the sky above there is an area of pale green, with a faint purple streak running through it,

By the time I reached her, it was fully dark, and the sky was a spectacular mix of green and purple and red. Aurora over Arthur's Seat in Edinburgh, looking south, the sky has bands of purple and red running across it Aurora over Arthur's Seat in Edinburgh, looking south, the sky has bands of purple and red running across it

 

 

Looking at social media later, I found people saying that they didn’t see much, but their cameras picked up more. A large part of the reason for this is that many people don’t seem to know how to see in the dark, they are too used to having artificial light all around them and never allow their eyes to adapt to the dark. I grew up in the countryside and learned that when you go out at night, if you allow your eyes ten to fifteen minutes to adjust to the dark, you can see a surprising amount, but if you turn on a torch you lose the ability to see beyond the pool of light from that torch.

This time-lapse video shows, the aurora borealis over Arthur’s Seat in Edinburgh on the evening of the 10th May 2024. Some people said they couldn’t see much, but the firefly like trails of torchlight on Arthur’s Seat show why they were unable to see, they just didn’t know how to look. Turn off your torch, let your eyes adjust to the dark, and you will be able to see the beauty that is around you.

I also took a second time-lapse video, starting a little after two on Saturday morning (11/05/2024), although the colours seem muted at the start, they really kick in about 32 seconds in and are still visible as the pre-dawn light comes in. The GoPro battery was empty about an hour before sunrise.

The other comment that was popping up on social media was that people thought it was like the opening to The Day of the Triffids, but of course, that wasn’t an aurora event, that was a giant meteor shower. So I am still waiting for the Triffids to arrive 😉