All the colours of the Aurora

For ages people have been fascinated by an incredibly beautiful and vivid light show, illuminating the night sky, known as an aurora. In his Naturales Quaestiones, Roman philosopher Seneca included a story about the Northern Lights noticed once above the city of Ostia. The aurora was so bright and red, that the fire alert was raised by a cohort of the army stationing nearby.

In recent times, our understanding of the phenomena has increased a lot. We can observe it from space and monitor its activity with space- and ground-based instruments. We know that auroral displays are not characteristic for Earth, but they also take place on other planets.

During this lesson we will talk about the origins of an aurora- why does it occur?

What colours can we expect to see and why?

What are the best places to spot it?

The lesson is broadcast live from the Polish Polar Station Hornsund in Svalbard, one of the monitoring sites of the geomagnetic activity.