I had another blog entry just about ready to go of our trip up into the St. Louis county MN wilderness and the Vermillion River, but I got a little sidetracked on Monday night. After giving up hope by late afternoon the clouds were going to break after a Coronal Mass Ejection (CME) hit the earth around 18 UTC, I was working on the other entry when a flood of text messages and phone calls from by chaser buddies down south finally got me interested to take a peek at a infrared sat image. When Tyler Burg called and said we was seeing auroras in Lincoln, NE and the Bz was hitting a -10S, I walked outside about 8:15 and looked at the north horizon expecting to see a faint green glow in the cloud deck to the north. The first thing I noticed were the bottoms of the green spikes were starting at about an altitude of about 50° and soaring overhead to the point I had to look a little south to see the tops! HO-LEE-CRAP!!! I knew this was not a "normal" aurora show we see up here. No sooner did I get a cam and tripod set up in the front yard (pointed STRAIGHT UP) did the real show start. I have never seen orange tinted auroras this far south that I can recall. For a little less than 10 minutes time stood still. It was perfect.
Complete set of images HERE!
Keep in mind all of these shots are at 11mm!
The peak of the show about 7:35 pm
As the main show began to wind down, the sky overhead with filled with a gentle river of reds and greens traveling from northwest to southeast.
What a great show! Having the clouds break just long enough to allow us to see the brilliant show was a blessing we are very thankful for!
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