Ah, to be Australian. We’ve got a few privileges up our sleeves. AFL is a great thing, and we’re slightly more ahead of the curb than everyone else because timezones. But there are many disadvantages too, such as politicians who eat onions and Gina Rinehart.
Also, the visual spectacle that is The Northern Lights (aka Aurora Borealis, or Aurora Australis when it comes down under) rarely graces us with its presence because of the, well, northern aspect of the whole thing.
Never fear, my fellow Aussies, ‘cos they’re heading to our shores right about now – sort of.
What we’d be seeing is called an aurora, which I assume is the slightly less well-known child of the big Borealis and Australis guns. Auroras are a true visual feast – surreal flashes of colour that explode across the sky and are simply the most beautiful thing the natural world has ever pulled off. Brava, Mother Nature.
They come about via a process that can only be described as a space orgy, but is better known as a coronal mass ejection. Basically, protons and electrons explode out of the sun and into the stratosphere.
This space sex went down on Saturday, and is set to disrupt Earth’s magnetic fields tonight; triggering a GEOMAGNETIC STORM that will set the auroras in motion.
A very authoritative space scientist person, who goes by the name Dr David Neudegg, says the odds are 50/50 that the auroras could hit parts of Australia. So, here’s hoping. While Tassie had a huge light show of its own a few weeks ago, this time around South Australia would be the lucky buggers.
If things keep going this way, I’d think that the auroras would surely be able to keep cruising up the east coast. Sydney wouldn’t even need bloody NYE fireworks.
I went on a pilgrimage to the Arctic Circle to see Aurora Borealis in 2012 and didn’t even get a look in. Shouldn’t have bothered, hey?
Source: ABC News.
Photo: The Simpsons.
