Predictions of auroral activity had been all over the local news since mid-week. Friends and relatives had been asking me if I had heard of the pending Northern Lights display. My reply dampened their expectations since the Kp index was only forecast to hit 5 or 6. Besides that the timing of peak activity was supposed to occur when our local area was under cloudy skies.
Anyway I woke at 4:30 this morning and looked out to see that the sky had cleared. So I checked my favorite website
http://spaceweather.com/ to see what the geomagnetic conditions were. They indicated a level of Kp 5 which doesn't make for a visually detectable display from my location but my camera can sometimes catch it anyway. So I packed the camera and the dog and headed toward the state park.
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| Slightly green on the horizon at level Kp 5 |
The strength of the northern lights can vary quickly and they did. Fortunately intensity to probably Kp 6 and the display became barely visible to my eye but easily within the range of my camera.
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| Exposure - 30 seconds at f/3.5 and ISO 8000 |
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| Telephone pole and sand silo cropped out. |
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| Milky Way over Lake Michigan |
