{"id":13122,"date":"2024-07-08T10:01:59","date_gmt":"2024-07-08T10:01:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/used82.com\/?p=13122"},"modified":"2024-07-08T10:01:59","modified_gmt":"2024-07-08T10:01:59","slug":"electron-storm-caused-rare-polar-rain-aurora-seen-from-earth-for-the-first-time-ever","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/used82.com\/?p=13122","title":{"rendered":"Electron storm caused rare ‘polar rain’ aurora seen from Earth for the first time ever"},"content":{"rendered":"

The unexpected aurora surprised many on Christmas Day 2022<\/h2>\n

A remarkable Christmas Day aurora observed over the Arctic back in 2022 was as a result of a ‘rainstorm’ of electrons coming directly from the sun.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Japanese and\u00a0US<\/a>-based\u00a0scientists<\/a>\u00a0have been working over recent months and even years to explain the impressive display many saw while enjoying their Christmas dinner over 18 months ago.<\/p>\n

It was the first time a rare aurora of that kind had been seen from the ground, coming at a time when the gusts of the solar wind had almost completely dropped off.<\/p>\n

This left a region of calm around Earth while many were enjoying the Christmas festivities with their nearest and dearest.<\/p>\n

Usual auroras we see have a very similar pattern, as they move and pulsate, with clearly discernible shapes in the sky.<\/p>\n

\n
\"The<\/div>\n

The Northern Lights over Norway. (Getty Stock Photo)<\/cite><\/div>\n

Powered by electrons from the solar wind, a stream of charged particles that flow from the sun become trapped in an extension of Earth’s magnetic field called the magnetotail.<\/p>\n

More extreme\u00a0weather<\/a>\u00a0events see trapped electrons flow down Earth’s magnetic field lines to the poles, as they encounter molecules in Earth’s atmosphere.<\/p>\n

They typically collide with them, which then prompts them to glow in the colors of the aurora – whether that be blue, green or red.<\/p>\n

The aurora that took place on Christmas Day 2022 was very different, as the spectacle seen in Norway was a faint, featureless glow that spanned 4,000 kilometres in extent.<\/p>\n

On top of that, it had no structure, no pulsing or varying brightness.<\/p>\n

And the aurora certainly made a bit of history too, as no type of space event like it had ever been seen from Earth before.<\/p>\n

\n
\"An<\/div>\n

An electron storm caused the aurora. (Getty Stock Photo)<\/cite><\/div>\n

With this aurora, dwindling solar winds allowed ‘an intense flux of electrons’ to reach the atmosphere.<\/p>\n

This created a polar rain aurora, according to the research papers.<\/p>\n

Keisuke Hosokawa, from the Center for Space Science and Radio Engineering at the University of Electro-Communications in Tokyo, said: “When the solar wind disappeared, an intense flux of electrons with an energy of >1keV was observed by the DMSP, which made the polar rain aurora visible even from the ground as bright greenish emissions.”<\/p>\n

The diameter of the magnetic funnel was also different from the ordinary, opening at about 7,500 kilometres when projected at Earth’s distance from the sun.<\/p>\n

This essentially provides reasoning as to why the aurora seemed so smooth.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The unexpected aurora surprised many on Christmas Day 2022 A remarkable Christmas Day aurora observed…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13122","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"aioseo_notices":[],"views":110,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/used82.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13122","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/used82.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/used82.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/used82.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/used82.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13122"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/used82.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13122\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/used82.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13122"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/used82.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13122"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/used82.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13122"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}