Aurora Australis
Have you ever witnessed nature’s light show dancing across the night sky? This colourful light display is often referred to and known as the “The Southern lights”. What causes this spectacular illumination Aurora Australis?
The sun is always active, every few minutes the sun ejects a solar flare out into space. Sometimes, not often, the solar flare is large enough that a gigantic cloud of ions, electrons and atoms is ejected into space.
The ions, electrons and atoms fly through space until they hit Earth’s magnetic field. This field acts as an invisible shield. Because of the shape of the magnetic field the particles from the ejected cloud are led to the North and South poles.
When the ions hit Earth’s upper atmosphere they get excited and accelerate. Then they collide with other particles and release energy in the form of light.
The more energy that is released the brighter the Aurora is. At the North Pole the light is called Aurora Borealis, and at the South Pole, Aurora Australis.
