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Comment by robga | Hacker News Reader

The video shows northern lights for the most part. I like that it's a video and you can see people move stuttery/stop-motion. Typically, northern lights are posted as picture and you have no idea what it was really like irl. I saw it once in Finland and thought it was clouds very faintly moving against the night sky. "Too bad," I thought, "if there were lights then this obscured them". The next morning I saw pictures where it looked like the most spectacular thing: those "clouds" were northern lights! Here at least, it's obvious that the exposure time per frame is cranked up because we don't perceive people as stuttering during the night.

(Later I saw the lights properly in Iceland, but it was still just a faint green haze. Can be mistaken for city glow at a glance, but if you look for a bit it becomes clear that it's moving slightly and too green. Again less than what one might be lead to expect)

That's not always the case. I saw them in Iceland and yes, they were faint one day (such that only my camera could see them), but another day they were really bright, and they looked like waves in the sky, changing very quickly. It depends on the day.

Sorry mate, but you did not see them properly. In February, we had some that looked like in the video to the naked eye. And I was in the outskirts of Stockholm, so neither that remote nor that far north. Obviously doesn't happen that often, though the locals weren't bothered much.

I know it gets better than what I saw in general, but this was about three months of being in Finland and Iceland cumulatively (both times during fall). Figured that's the best most people can hope to see, at least without specifically going very far north at the right time of year for this specific purpose, and so the pictures just aren't representative of what you are likely to see while in these countries

>Figured that's the best most people can hope to see(...) so the pictures just aren't representative of what you are likely to see while in these countries

Its quite wrong to assume your three month experience is representative for what you would expect to see of northern lights in Iceland and Finland.

I don't think most people's holidays are going to be longer? Not sure what makes you say that. I understand one might get lucky or unlucky, are you saying my 3 months happened to be extremely unlucky and therefore it's "quite wrong" that this can be extrapolated to an average experience when visiting the countries?

There's probably a big difference between what you could see under ideal circumstances, and what you're likely to see during a normal vacation.

I live in Winnipeg, way south of Finland, and I've seen spectacular northern lights not far from here.

Really? Isn't Winnipeg only 50 degrees north? That's south of Amsterdam, and we can absolutely never see northern lights here. It's something for which you need to go to northern Scandinavia.

Yup. It also gets down to -40 in the winter.

I'm less surprised about that. Land climate and no warm gulf stream makes for a totally different climate. But I didn't expect the northern lights to be ruled by temperature.

I think it is more ruled by the earth magnetic field. And as the magnetic pole is closer to north america, you have them further (geographically) south there.

That's a lot more likely. Magnetic North is 80 degrees north rather than 90, and in Canada, so if you can see the northern lights at 50 degrees there, that would be comparable to 60 or 70 degrees elsewhere.

Patall is right, I was just pointing out another surprising winter-related fact. But it's not surprising if you understand weather systems.

I'm in Amsterdam and I can't even see the stars at night, but in Stockholm they get this and don't even care?

They always look better in pictures. Even a cheap camera phone will take a good picture of them.

Don't go into the trap to think that all northern lights are that faint. Iceland are pretty far South in many ways, in addition the intensity varies. Sometimes it is just spectacular, a lot more spectacular than on pictures.

I've seen the northern lights once before with my own eyes and no you cannot mistake them for "clouds" or "city lights". You unfortunately probably saw a very faint version, probably low to the horizon.

And no I wasn't even in the far north. It was during a solar storm and I was in my own backyard in southern Michigan.

Aurora that looks grey is simply too feint for your eyes to perceive the colour[0][1]. One way you can confirm whether what you're seeing is aurora or not, is to take a picture with a digital camera. Camera sensors can discern the green (or whatever) hue, whereas the cones (which perceive colour) cannot pick up such dim light.

Once the aurora becomes stronger, you can absolutely see shockingly-vibrant green, pink, purple, and other colours, literally streaming/swirling/dancing across the sky. It's an unforgettable experience. I hope you have the chance to see this at full-strength sometime, and I absolutely recommend seeking it out if possible. (extra-recommended to watch while sitting in an outdoor hot tub at midnight in -10*C in Iceland, of course!)

[0] https://www.neworld.com/blog/2018/aurora-borealis-and-our-ey...

[1] https://futurism.com/how-we-see-the-aurora-borealis-camera-v...

Sounds like they were just about to pack up and leave, and then this happens. Spectacular, and incredibly lucky that they got to see it like that. Not to mention those northern lights look great. I should go to Iceland some day.

1:06 - what is moving in the top right quadrant of the video amongst the stars?

Probably a satellite in low-earth orbit. They only take a few minutes to go from one horizon to the other. Since it is very bright, I am guessing it is the ISS.

Update: Iceland is too far north (64°N) to see the ISS (max 51.6°N). Too bad.

Was about to say, northern lights are not in the south as seen from Iceland so ISS would not be probable. It should be possible to figure out what high-inclination object was in the sky at the right time of day (it needs to reflect sunlight) on September 13th as the video description says it was shot on

Edit: or based on the fireball timing, mister detective here just realised. The comments even say "Is it possible that it was on 12.09.2023 at 22:35? We were in Höfn watching the northern lights when we saw it" and a reply confirms it

Why does the fireballs tail persist in the sky?

Is this some type of long exposure video setup?

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