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Missed the northern lights on Thursday? There’s still another chance

A person is taking a picture of aurora-like lights in a starry night sky over a calm lake with their phone.
Thursday’s aurorae were likely to be the most intense since the spring — and there’s a chance for another show Friday night. | Source: Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu via Getty Images

The northern lights were visible from the Bay Area Thursday, giving skywatchers and amateur photographers a celestial show that’s typically visible only in sparsely populated places like Alaska and Greenland. It’s a geomagnetic follow-up to the cosmic radiance locals saw in May, when solar storms lit up the sky in ribbons of purple, red, and green.

Unlike meteor showers, which have a predictable peak, the aurora borealis does its own thing. “Generally, it should be all night long,” said Rob Steenburgh, a scientist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Space Weather Prediction Center, said of Thursday’s dispay. “It does have periods where it’s more active or less active, but we don’t have the precision to forecast down to that level.”

Thursday’s forecast called for partly cloudy skies in San Francisco, with clearer skies inland — and Friday looks similar. Mountaintops and other places away from the glare of city lights offer the best viewing opportunities — and it may help to venture north. In May, users posted photos to X that revealed they had good luck spotting the northern lights from the Marin Headlands and San Rafael’s China Camp Beach. 

Even if the aurorae are faint or invisible to the naked eye, smartphone cameras can capture spectacular displays of solar plasma interacting with the Earth’s atmosphere. The best way to record the shimmering heavens on an iPhone is to turn on night mode to increase the exposure time to 10 or 15 seconds.

Red aurora-like lights streak across the night sky above glowing city lights and a calm lake.
The best way to see the ribbons of light is to escape the city lights, as seen in this image captured near China Camp Beach in San Rafael. | Source: Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu via Getty Images

If you don’t mind waking up in the middle of the night but don’t want to leave the house, there are webcams posted atop the 3,400-foot Mount Diablo and on Ballard Ridge in Modoc County, California’s northeastern corner.

Aurorae occur because of the 11-year cycle of the sun’s magnetic field — specifically, an increase or decrease in the number of sunspots. Prior to this year, the last time NOAA issued a watch for activity this intense was in 2005. The plume of ionized gas and other charged particles known as a “coronal mass ejection” arrived this morning, according to NOAA, which ranks the intensity of solar weather on a scale from G1 to G5. Tonight’s display is expected to rate at a “strong” G3. 

If you sleep through this one, you may have another chance soon. “We’re in the midst of a solar maximum, the highest point in terms of sunspots and the activity produced by sunspots, which includes eruptions,” Steenburgh said. “So it’s by no means the last time. Don’t lose heart!”

Astrid Kane can be reached at astrid@sfstandard.com