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Oct 31, 2016
Ghost Aurora over Canada
Image Credit & Copyright: Yuichi Takasaka
Courtesy of http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html
Ghost Aurora over Canada
Image Credit & Copyright: Yuichi Takasaka
Courtesy of http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html
What does this aurora look like to you?
While braving the cold to watch the skies above northern
Canada
early one morning in 2013, a most unusual aurora appeared.
The aurora definitely appeared to be
shaped like something , but what?
Two ghostly possibilities recorded
by the astrophotographer were "witch" and "goddess of dawn",
but please
feel free to suggest your own
Halloween-enhanced impressions.
Regardless of fantastical
pareidolic interpretations,
the pictured aurora had a
typical green
color and was surely caused by the scientifically commonplace action of high energy particles from space interacting with
oxygen in
Earth's upper atmosphere.
In the image foreground, at the bottom, is a frozen
Alexandra Falls, while
evergreen trees
cross the middle.
