April 17-18, 2021 – Aurora Borealis

Last night may have been the best aurora displays I’ve seen in years. And it was persistent. When I first walked out there was a bright band in the southern sky. About 10 minutes later the sky erupted in low-altitude deep pinks to the north.

At about 1 am it blew up over the northern sky again, and again. Below a compilation of 3 timelapses. The first one started just before midnight on April 17th. The aurora finished strong at the end, just after 1 am on April 18th.

It’s really a treat to get to see so much of the northern lights so late in the season. It would be great if we could get a few more nights, tonight looks to be good, although the geomagnetic storm is calming down. There are some sunspots crackling on the Sun, and at least one might be Earth-pointed soon. There’s just enough darkness left that one might give us even more shows in the coming days!

Below are a couple still images from the timelapse above. Here’s a link to the photo gallery (will be updated in the coming days: https://photos.lwpetersen.com/Date/2021/April/2021-04-18/

Get my 2023 Alaska Wall Calendar or Aurora Calendar here!