Faint aurora seen on the 16th April 2025

A week ago I had a major auroral alert on my phone from AuroraWatch. This started about 2pm BST and continued on till 10pm. During this time the geomagnetic activity ranged from 500 to 750 nT according to the magnetometer at Sumburgh Head. I began taking pictures about 21:30 but for the most part I was thwarted in seeing very much due to thin cloud and haze. However, on examining my photographs I did pick out some activity at 22:17 (21:17 UT) as can be seen below:-

 

This is not easy to see but there is a distinct pink patch to the right of the cottage near the horizon. In this area the constellation of Cygnus is rising and the pink aurora is near the back of the asterism that makes up the body of the swan and its right wing. In fact, I think there is generally a pink glow that extends from here at about the same altitude towards the constellation of Cassiopeia at the left of the picture. This picture was taken on a Nikon D90 with a Nikkor VR 18-105 f/3.5-5.6 ED lens at 18mm. The exposure was 20s at f/3.5 ISO 1600.

Looking harder at some of my other photographs there was another taken 8 minutes earlier at 22:09 (21:09 UT) which showed some activity:-

This was a shorter exposure of 8 seconds and I had to increase the brightness to bring out the detail. Again there is a pink colouration above and slightly to the left of the cottage. Both images face roughly north.

Other BAA observers saw this aurora about the same time I did and had a much better view (see, for example, this nice image by Grant Privett in Salisbury). 

All text and images © Duncan Hale-Sutton 2025