Aurora

According to SpaceWeather.com, the sun has just experiences the most powerful flare in years, tossing a coronal mass ejection (CME) toward Earth. This might cause bright auroras October 29th or 30th. The director of the UMD observatory has set up a page to monitor the activity: UM Observatory: Aurora over College Park. If the meter gets into the yellow or if the activity on the map grows and covers the upper states, we might just be able to see the aurora here.

I’ve only see the aurora once. Once it came down as far as the Twin Cities — it was white, rather than colorful, but still magical. My brother had gotten home late, and woke me up to see it. At first I was mad that he’d interrupted a good night’s sleep, but I found myself going back outside after he’d gone to bed. I don’t know how to describe how it made me feel — it was like being in a dream world, or a world where magic is real.