Fenomena Kutub yang Menakjubkan

The Polar Lights is a phenomenon that fascinated human kind since ancient times. These spectacular curtains of colored lights are usually observed at night particularly in the Polar Regions. Let’s take a look at some of this stunning display of nature.

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The northern lights are streaks of sheets of pale, flickering, colored lights that are sometimes seen in the night sky in far northern regions. Their proper name is aurora borealis, from the Roman goddess of dawn, Aurora and the Greek name for north wind, Boreas. The name was given by Galileo Galilei in the year 1616. The same effect also occurs in the far south, where it is known as aurora australis, from the Latin word meaning “south”.

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This stunning display of nature happens between 80 through 1,000 km (50-620mi) above the Earth’s surface. They are caused by electrically charged particles from the sun. These particles strike the Earth’s atmosphere and release energy in the form of light. The effects can come in colors of red, blue, green and purple. It most often occurs from September through October and from March to April. Their most spectacular display are most common every 11 years during high solar sunspot activity as there is an increase in the amount of energy released by the sun.

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One of the most memorable was the January 25, 1938 aurora storm when the display covered the entire skies of Europe making people think their towns were on fire. Many fire alarms were rung causing citizens to panic. People in some countries thought the world was coming to an end. It was called the Fatima Storm as it was said to be one of the Fatima Prophesies by Roman Catholics worldwide.
During the February 11, 1958 aurora storm, the display can be seen as far as Los Angeles, Boston, Seattle and Canada. The lights were so intense over Europe that people worried about fires and wars.
The March 13, 1989 storm was seen as far south as Florida and Cuba with the majority of people in the Northern Hemisphere gazing at the most spectacular polar display in living memory.
The next northern lights display peak is on 2011 and 2012.

Source : http://scienceray.com