Rare red Northern lights

According to Rayann Elzein from Utsjoki in Finland, several nights in a row, lovers of night sky observations photographed the red Aurora, and this is an extremely rare phenomenon. On the night of October 13, the lights appeared as if out of nowhere, the green layer was crowned with red. The same thing happened on October 12.

Usually the Northern lights are green — this is due to the glow of oxygen atoms about 150 km above the earth's surface. Red Northern lights are also caused by oxygen atoms, but at altitudes between 150 and 500 km, where the temperature and density of the atmosphere create suitable conditions for atomic reactions that emit red photons.

In Elzein's images, the red color is visible above the green, but usually the red Northern lights are too faint to be seen or photographed. They come from an extremely rarefied layer of the atmosphere, and in addition, as expert Les Cowley explains, the very slow atomic reactions that produce red photons are easily interrupted. Even the most experienced observers rarely see them.