A surprisingly bright northern lights were visible over the province on Sunday evening. “A solar flare hit the earth and briefly caused a G3 geomagnetic storm, as a result of which temporary auroras were visible as far as the south of the Netherlands,” says Wouter van Bernebeek of Weerplaza.
“It was at least eight years ago – the last time this took place in March 2015 – that the northern lights were so clearly visible in our region,” says Wouter. “But then it was cloudy. A special situation, rightly so!”
‘We look diagonally at the top of the northern lights’
As a weatherman, Wouter knew that there was a chance of seeing the northern lights on Sunday evening. “But you expect that along the north coast of the Netherlands, it is more common there. Then you have to expose your camera for a very long time and then you can see it a bit. But on Sunday evening there was such a violent solar storm! Then those northern lights come very strongly to the south. Even so far that at one point it could be seen in Flevoland and Utrecht. Then I thought: I’ll just stand by the water in Cuijk for a while. On the way to Cuijk I already saw a red glow on the horizon. So visually, without a camera. That surprised me enormously, I have never seen that in this area before.”
In Scandinavia, the aurora often looks green. “There you are really under the northern lights. Here we look diagonally at the top of the northern lights. Then the light is often purple or pinkish. But the bottom can still be green. You can also see that on my photo.”
charged particles
In addition to Cuijk – where Wouter recorded this phenomenon – reports of this special weather phenomenon also came from Genemuiden (Overijssel), Nijkerk (Gelderland), Dokkum (Friesland), Franeker (Friesland), Lauwersoog (Groningen) and the Wadden area, among others. Many people took pictures of it for social media.
The northern lights are created when charged particles from the sun collide at enormous speeds of hundreds of kilometers per second with nitrogen and oxygen particles high in our atmosphere, at an altitude of about 100 to 300 kilometers. These collisions give the particles in our atmosphere an increased energy level. To get rid of this elevated energy level, the particles emit energy in the form of light: the Northern Lights.
Again
There is a chance of seeing the Northern Lights again tonight. but Wouter tempers expectations. “Last night it was nice and clear weather, but I think there will be more clouds this evening. Then it will be more difficult to see.”