What Causes Auroras?

SciShow tackles a Quick Question with a longish answer: What causes auroras? TL;DR: It's a breathtaking display of particle physics in action.
----------
Messages from our Subbable subscribers:
----------

----------
Looking for SciShow elsewhere on the internet?

Sources:

[EasterWitch]

I've got a friend who didn't want to learn about how aurora worked when we went to school together. She wanted to believe it was magic.
I myself doesn't think it becomes any less magical if you learn how it works. In my opinion it becomes even more magical.

[PinkChucky]

This is definitely one of the things I want to see in my lifetime.

[oskarrolandspets]

so glad that i live in northern-Norway so i can see auroras every winter

[AdamBerkan]

"The reason we don't talk about the real answer is because it's complicated and involves a lot of physics.  Answers do that a lot around here"

Awesome

[NickSheridanVids]

The footage of Brian Cox watching Auroras pleases me. He spends the run up talking science science and more science, then when he actually sees them remarks that it's "like ancestral spirits pouring out of the earth"

[McJuggerNuggets]

Auroras are so beautiful...and I don't use that term often.

[faheafa]

Very rarely do you find a channel that explains so in-depth. These guys deserve every subscriber and more!

[QwertyuiopThePie]

I've always wanted to see one of those. Maybe someday I will, someday.

[BenedictRaikes]

I'm lucky enough to see them every winter from my house. Truly one of the most amazing things I've ever seen and you never get used to it. So good to finally understand them!

[Deshiba]

So short answer to the cause of auroras?

Sunfarts.

[searaph]

My family has a cabin on the North part of Good Spirit Lake in Saskatchewan.  We have been able to see the lights a few times and they really are amazing.  They look ethereal and beautiful, even in the summer.

[H-Mark]

Come to Norway, we have bloody awesome Auroras. Spent an hour out in -20C during a night a couple of years ago. Was treated to a wavy curtain of green, which was spiraling into a red centre. Literally "awesome". 

[topstitchgirl]

I've seen auroras and I was nowhere near the North Pole. I was maybe 30 mins North of Quebec City out in the wilderness with almost no light pollution. It was pretty cool to watch.

[ChrisMarabate]

The following is not related to this video but it is related to the question I'm going to ask...

It fascinates me when I consider the fact that your experience of time slows down more and more the closer you get to the speed of light. This means that if you could reach the speed of light, your time would stop completely. Therefore from the point of view of a beam of light, it leaves its source and reaches it destination at the exact same instant regardless of how far it had to travel.

Light does not experience time!

So my question is...

Is time an illusion?

[illdie]

I've never thought that the auroras were that interesting. I know that it would be a lot more awe inspiring if I saw them firsthand, (which i still want to do), but aside from that it isn't really all that exciting, they just seem like long colored clouds.

[calicompis]

I see auroras every year during our dark and cold north Swedish winters :D 

[xxAlchemistressxx]

I've seen the northern lights in Iceland some two years ago. There had been snowstorms all day, and when we arrived at our hotel the clouds parted just enough to block the moon and for about five minutes it was visible before the snowstorms hit again. It may be science, but it still was magical :)

[FNIX]

I'm feeling blessed by living in just the perfect spot for aurora borealis watching, as I live in Tromsø in northern Norway. Most of the spectacular images of aurora borealis you see on the internet is taken around here. The town is not very big (around 70.000 people) and thus not much human produced lights like streetlights. Because of that you do not need to travel far to get a uninterupted view of the light in the sky. Well, we CAN see it from the town too, when the activity is higest.
You are all welcome to visit us here to have a good auora borealis experience :)

[GuiverBG]

Nice explanation Hank! Good job, I liked it :)

[babybott]

Super interesting! I hope to see them in person someday as well.