The Aurora Borealis, or Northern Lights, is truly a spectacular sight to behold. Your public lands across the United States offer unparalleled opportunities to gaze up into the heavens, and that’s certainly true in Alaska.
According to the Alaska Public Lands Information Center:
“The Northern Lights certainly can seem a bit alien at times, and many stories assign them some sort of mystical origin. In actuality, they begin at the sun. What one is seeing while watching the beautiful green, red, or blue lights is charged particles (typically electrons, but occasionally protons as well) colliding with the gases in our atmosphere. The resulting aurora’s color depends on which gas the particles collide with. Blue aurora results from a collision with molecular nitrogen, Green with molecular oxygen, and Red comes from a collision with atomic oxygen, which only exists very high in our atmosphere. These charged particles are shed by the sun during sun spot activity, which means Aurora frequencies are vastly increased whenever there is high sunspot activity.”
While the photos are undoubtedly spectacular, nothing beats viewing the northern lights in person. For information on experiencing all the Dalton Highway has to offer, visit http://on.doi.gov/GYeaXI .
Photo 1 by David Bachrach. All other photos by Karen Deatherage.