One of the most powerful magnetic storms hit Earth on November 5 and has not subsided yet. It was caused by a plasma cloud ejected by the Sun towards our planet on November 3. The plasma ejection was recorded by the LASCO coronagraph (a telescope allowing to observe the solar corona outside of eclipses - note from the www1.ru editorial).
The coronagraph is on board SOHO - Solar and Heliospheric Observatory - a spacecraft launched into space in 1995 by the European Space Agency and NASA.
Scientists classify the plasma ejection as being low in intensity. Global space agencies were confident that the plasma cloud would approach Earth on November 6. It was expected to generate a G1 (initial level) magnetic storm.
However, it turned out that the gas cloud traveled the distance from the Sun to Earth of 150 million km in just two days and hit our planet's magnetic field with substantial force. The current level of magnetic storm is rated at G3.
As explained in the Russian Laboratory of Solar Astronomy, Earth is surrounded by interplanetary gas with a temperature of 300,000 °C, the speed of the solar wind has increased to 500 km/s. All of this provoked the appearance of the Northern Lights (Aurora borealis) in the Eastern Hemisphere of Earth at latitudes from the 65th parallel of north latitude.
Scientists do not rule out the appearance of the Northern Lights at the 50th parallel. Laboratory specialists are not yet making predictions of how long the magnetic storm that caused the atmospheric optical phenomenon will last.
Meanwhile, Russians from different parts of the country are posting pictures of the Northern Lights on social networks. Residents of the North and South of Russia were delighted with the Aurora borealis, which decorated the night sky.