November 12, 2025
2 min read
See Photos of the Northern Lights That Dazzled the U.S.
A severe geomagnetic storm brought spectacular auroras to much of the U.S. on Tuesday night
The aurora borealis glows above rural Monroe County near Bloomington, Ind., on November 12, 2025.
Jeremy Hogan/Getty Images
On Tuesday night sky watchers across the U.S. were treated to a phenomenal aurora display, the product of a severe geomagnetic storm triggered by a recent burst of solar activity.
Auroras were visible in areas that included Indiana, New Jersey, northern California, Florida and Texas. That is remarkably far south for the northern lights, or aurora borealis, which are typically restricted to a doughnut surrounding the North Pole.
The southern lights, or aurora australis, were also visible in parts of Australia.
On supporting science journalism
If you’re enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today.
Green auroras light up the night sky over Monroe, Wisconsin, on November 11, 2025, during one of the strongest solar storms in decades.
Ross Harried/NurPhoto via Getty Images
According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Space Weather Prediction Center, which forecasts the effects of solar activity on Earth and its surroundings, geomagnetic storm conditions are expected to continue at a somewhat lower level.
The northern lights seen above a vineyard in Geyserville, Calif., on November 11.
Alvin A.H. Jornada/San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images
And the event isn’t over yet. Auroras occur after the sun emits what scientists call a coronal mass ejection, or CME, in the direction of Earth. A CME is essentially a blob of the plasma and magnetic field that makes up our star. When this material interacts with the gases in Earth’s atmosphere, the resulting energy transfers light up the skies.
Last night’s auroras were the result of CMEs released on Sunday and Monday, but Tuesday also saw such an outburst from the sun, and experts expect it will reach Earth in the coming hours. An initial aurora forecast for tonight suggests the spectacle could continue tonight only for a more northern portion of the country.
The northern lights were observed in the sky over Morris County, N.J., and captured using long-exposure photography on November 12.
Lokman Vural Elibol/Anadolu via Getty Images
Auroras are part of a class of phenomena dubbed space weather and are both the prettiest and the least harmful example. Other types of space weather can be dangerous to technology in orbit and even to the power grids that sustain modern life on Earth. And the current space weather activity has had a perhaps surprising side effect: delaying today’s scheduled launch of a Blue Origin rocket that will carry a pair of NASA spacecraft bound to study space weather at Mars.
Whether or not you were able to catch sight of an aurora, consider submitting your observations to the volunteer science project Aurorasaurus. Through this program, scientists and sky watchers team up to understand the what the effects of specific space weather events are, as well as how auroras work more generally.
It’s Time to Stand Up for Science
If you enjoyed this article, I’d like to ask for your support. Scientific American has served as an advocate for science and industry for 180 years, and right now may be the most critical moment in that two-century history.
I’ve been a Scientific American subscriber since I was 12 years old, and it helped shape the way I look at the world. SciAm always educates and delights me, and inspires a sense of awe for our vast, beautiful universe. I hope it does that for you, too.
If you subscribe to Scientific American, you help ensure that our coverage is centered on meaningful research and discovery; that we have the resources to report on the decisions that threaten labs across the U.S.; and that we support both budding and working scientists at a time when the value of science itself too often goes unrecognized.
In return, you get essential news, captivating podcasts, brilliant infographics, can’t-miss newsletters, must-watch videos, challenging games, and the science world’s best writing and reporting. You can even gift someone a subscription.
There has never been a more important time for us to stand up and show why science matters. I hope you’ll support us in that mission.
