Can humans sense the aurora borealis?
I’m pretty much convinced that the aurora borealis now wakes me up. It’s a regular occurrence the past few months to wake up in the middle of the night, step outside to an aurora show, and a few minutes later the aurora is gone.
Yesterday morning, I woke up at about 03:20. When I looked outside, much of the clear sky was full of colour. I quickly got my camera stuff together, and the first photo below was shot at 03:34.
There was a great deal of movement in the aurora, and I changed shooting locations a few times. This was shot 4 minutes later.
I was starting to think about driving to a better location, but didn’t want to miss this display, which was getting better, with more reds and purples.
I shot one more photo at 03:41 then went inside, got some very basic gear and my car keys, and headed out.
By the time I got to the car 10 minutes later, though, the display was fading, already not worth photographing. By 04:10 it was gone, with just a canopy of stars remaining.
In my 9,400-member Aurora group on Facebook, only one other person reported seeing this display. That makes it feel like a special gift. Lady Aurora not only wakes me gently, she dances just for me. 🙂
It’s that time of year when people start wondering how long the aurora will still be visible as the skies get lighter. The latest I’ve shot has been April 25th, but one of the group’s former members has posted photos from as late as May 14th, though the sky is so bright I probably wouldn’t have even bothered getting my camera out.
Back to my opening question about whether humans can sense the aurora borealis. Although that doesn’t specifically seem to have been studied, this article validates it as a possibility.
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Interesting stuff – never heard of that intuition before but you seem as likely a candidate as any. I think you need a nickname, something catchy – to rake in the accolades when your premonitions come to pass up in the night skies – and something equally as clever to be used when you have prognosticated publicly and some crow needs to eaten. We could have used you last night in the NE USA… a big show was promised by those who should know but never was seen by the likes of me.
I’m sorry to hear that you missed the show – as did we, but because of clouds. I saw a bunch of great photos of it from along Lake Superior somewhere, but I don’t think it went as far south as was prognosticated. Many people seem to know me as “The ExploreNorth guy” but that’s not very catchy 🙂
I’m sure you know that when people go blind, other senses increase their capabilities. I’m intrigued by the possibility that with what’s going on with my brain, my ability to detect the electrical energy of the aurora has been increased.