South Cheshire sky watchers were treated to one of the most spectacular Northern Lights shows for years, writes Jonathan White.
A strong geomagnetic storm and a clear sky last night (May 10) meant people witnessed a rare dazzling display of colours from the spectacular northern lights aurora.
Vibrant colours of red, purple and green were on display.
Local social media groups were flooded with fantastic photos taken by local residents including Wistaston, Crewe, Willaston and Nantwich.
The northern lights could be seen across the UK, from Scotland down as far south as Kent.
At one point during the evening on X, formerly known as Twitter, ‘#aurora’ was trending at number 1, closely followed by ‘Crewe’ at number 2 after Crewe Alexandra’s play-off heroics against Doncaster Rovers.
For the first time since January 2005, the NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center in America issued a severe geomagnetic storm watch.
A sunspot, an area of high solar activity 16 times wider than Earth, has a number of solar flares and complex coronal mass ejections hurtling towards planet Earth.
The northern lights, also known as auroras, are caused by charged particles from the sun colliding with gases in the Earth’s atmosphere.
When these particles collide with oxygen and nitrogen atoms in the atmosphere, they create the beautiful light display we see in the sky
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