Northern Lights in UK seen as far south as Cornwall final evening

Sep 13, 2023 at 7:41 AM
Northern Lights in UK seen as far south as Cornwall final evening

The UK was handled to an unimaginable mild show within the sky final evening. 

The Northern Lights – often known as aurora borealis – could possibly be seen as far south as Cornwall.  The spectacular phenomenon is never seen additional south than Scotland.

The Met Office says the northern lights happen “as a consequence of solar activity” and “result from collisions of charged particles in the solar wind colliding with molecules in the Earth’s upper atmosphere”.

The nationwide climate forecaster says the lights seem as “large areas of colour including pale green, pink, shades of red, yellow, blue and violet in the direction due north”.

“During a weak aurora, the colours are very faint and spread out whereas an intense aurora features greater numbers of and brighter colours which can be seen higher in the sky with a distinct arc.

“This unimaginable prevalence could be often seen within the evening sky over Britain,” added the Met Office. And last night was one of those rare nights. 

On X, the social media platform previously known as Twitter, a photographer from Penzance called Nick said: “Fantastic show of the northern lights right here in Cornwall tonight.”

And self-proclaimed “climate fanatic” from the Midlands tweeted: “Absolutely unimaginable, northern lights from Birmingham this night.”

Even more spectacular images were shared by photographers in Ireland and Scotland. A ‘weather and tech freak’ based in Dublin posted an incredible photo of the neon pink display in Ireland.  They described it as “An evening I will not be forgetting any time quickly.”

Lancaster University-based AuroraWatch UK missed a ‘pink alert’, suggesting it was doubtless that the aurora could be seen by eye and digicam from anyplace within the UK, shortly after 2am this morning.