A Rare Celestial Display Over the Highlands
The aurora borealis put on its most vivid show in memory last Saturday, capturing the attention of Kennewick residents.
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A display of northern lights, the most vivid ever seen here, were plainly visible last Saturday night. The phenomenon was especially attractive to residents of the Highlands, whose view of the northern sky was unobstructed. The northern lights, scientifically known as the aurora borealis, appeared in a brilliant white arc in the northern heavens. Streamers of green light oscillated within the arc, but none of the more vivid hues often apparent in latitudes farther north were visible here. The display may be expected to be repeated on cloudless nights for the rest of the year. The aurora borealis reaches its maximum of display in periods or cycles of eleven years and at the same time that the sun spots are most numerous. The sun spots have this year reached their maximum number, having steadily increased in successive seasons for several years.
“A display of northern lights, the most vivid ever seen here, were plainly visible last Saturday night.”
Scientific understanding of the sun's 11-year cycle and its relationship to the aurora was clearly evolving in 1916. Today, space weather remains a major field of study, though our modern reliance on satellites makes the magnetic disturbances mentioned in the article far more consequential to daily life than they were to the residents of the Highlands.
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