Aurora Australis over New Zealand + STEVE, A Meteor, The Moon & Venus

Aurora Australis over New Zealand + STEVE, A Meteor, The Moon & Venus

The night sky can be full of surprises. Take the sky over Lindis Pass, South Island, New Zealand one night in early October 2024. Instead of a typically calm evening sky filled with constant stars, a busy and dynamic night sky appeared. Suddenly visible were pervasive red aurora, green picket-fence aurora, a stable auroral red (SAR) arc, a STEVE, a meteor, and the Moon. Can you spot the faint meteor at the top of this image?

On the far right side of this picture, close to the Moon, an unusual type of aurora is present. It is called a Strong Thermal Emission Velocity Enhancement (STEVE). This lesser-known phenomena appears to form from a 'ribbon' of hot gases in the Earth's atmosphere.

Meanwhile, planet Venus is shining just above the horizon below the Moon and a little to the left.

All the above have outshone light from the center of our Milky Way Galaxy and two satellite galaxies: the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) and Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) visible in the Earth's southern skies. These objects were captured together on 28 exposures in five minutes through this magnificent panorama.

Auroras have been lighting up many skies recently as coronal mass ejections (CMEs) from our Sun unleash bursts of particles towards Earth that create colorful skies over latitudes usually too far from the Earth's poles to be viewed often.

Image Credit & Copyright: Tristian McDonald

Tristian's website: https://cre8tivestr3k.com/info-contact

Release Date: Oct. 16, 2024

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