On Sunday, April 23, 2023, we were treated to the rare sight of the Northern Lights over Illinois. This was due to a strong geomagnetic storm produced by the sun a few days earlier. The CME generated by the sun hit the Earth midday, and there was some concern that the majority of the activity was going to happen while the US was still in daylight.
As the sun set, glimpses of a red hue could be seen with the aid of my camera. As the sun continued to set and the skies got darker, more and more of the red and green tints could be seen. At this point, no part of the Aurora could be seen with the naked eye, but my camera was picking up the dancing lights quite well.
As the night went on, the lights got brighter and more energetic. Around 11 PM, the lights were filling up the whole screen of my camera, and a white ghostly light could be seen in the sky with the naked, dark-adjusted eye. This ghostly dancing glow was the Northern Lights.
The spectacle persisted well into the night, but the climax appeared to have passed, as the sky gradually subsided to a dim green glow resembling the one at the beginning of the night. It was already 1 AM, and I needed to swap out the memory card and battery of my camera. Reluctantly, I called it a night, hoping that I wasn’t missing out on another unexpected outburst of the Aurora.
All in all, it was the most impressive manifestation of the Northern Lights I had witnessed in quite some time, and certainly the most spectacular display this far south since 2017.
