May 18, 2017 • 42 mins
It wasn't too long ago that humans thought the polar lights were signs from the afterlife. Thanks to a 19th century Norwegian, we now understand that they are a fascinating interplay with Earth's magnetic field and wind from the sun.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to Stuff You Should Know from how Stuff Works
dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark,
There's Charles w Chuck Bryant, and Jerry's over there. So
this is Stuff you Should Know the podcast. Uh, we
(00:24):
want to give before we get started, a big congratulations
to our newest colleagues, Emily and Bridget with the official
relaunch of stuff Mom never told you, Yeah, Chuck. They
just debuted last week, I believe, and they come out
Wednesdays and Fridays. Huh yeah, so Monday, Tuesday, well, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday,
(00:47):
the four of us have you covered? Yeah, it's true.
Do we have any shows that come out on Monday?
We do? All right, Well, Jerry's nodding, so that means
we've got you covered every day of the week. Let's
just say that. Nice. That's the How Stuff Works way. Yeah. Yeah, anyway,
just congratulations to them. That's awesome. I know that they've
been running classic episodes while they were down and getting restarted,
(01:08):
and uh it's no small thing to come in and
take a show over. But they're doing an awesome job
and are both uh great broadcasters. And you know, I'm
I'm in support of them. Yeah, that's my official position.
I know that sounded weirdly political. Yeah, good luck and
best twishes to Bridget and Emily. So you guys go
(01:29):
check it out Wednesdays and Fridays anywhere you get podcasts.
You can get stuff Mom never told you. Yes, and apologize.
I apologize for my voice. Oh yeah, what's up with
your voice? Man? I've just had this upper respiratory thing
that won't go away, that stinks, and so unless I'm
constantly wetting my throat, it gets weirdly deep and cracky.
(01:51):
So are you paying a lot more than usual? Well,
I'm drinking a lot of water. I'm peeing a lot,
but I would literally have to drink between every sentence
to keep it silky smooth. Oh do you want to
record today? No, I'm fine. I'm not in pain, but
I just don't want anyone's ears to be in pain.
Have you heard of um? Oh? Man, now that I
(02:11):
say it, I realized I don't know the name of
the brand. But you know those like cough drops that
are actually like candy, but they market them as cough drops,
the cherry flavored ones. M No, I mean like they're
literal candy. Um no, but it's basically the most delicious
jolly rancher you've ever had. It lacks the sour, it's
(02:34):
all sweet. So it's green apple. No, they're red. I
can't remember what they're called. People are screaming at their um. Yeah,
well their phones, their tablets, their computers. Right now, settled down, everybody, Yes,
we chuck and I agree with you. This is maybe
the worst intro we've ever done. And Jerry does too.
(02:54):
So let's get to it, shall we. So we're talking
aurora's today. Yeah, and generally we're talking about the two
most famous auroras. Uh And I say too, because I
don't even want to give I don't want to short
change the Aurora Australis. No, it definitely does get short changed,
(03:14):
though totally. Did you Did you come upon why? I
came upon the explanation a couple of times? Oh about why? Yeah?
Uh I didn't. But I'm gonna have a guess. Okay,
let's have it. Is it not quite as magnificent? Nope?
Are there not as many people there? Yes? There you go,
There are fewer. There's there's less land around the South
(03:38):
Pole as there is around the North Pole. Um, I
should say the magnetic South and North pole. Um. So
there's fewer eyes to see it, so the grandeur of
it is is um less obvious too as many people.
But yeah, that's that's why the Northern Lights get all
the all the top billing. Plus, no one ever named
a strain of weed after the Aurora Australis out about
(04:00):
that too. Southern Lights, what is that? I bet you
there's one. There's a poison. There a like a head
shop in Atlanta called Southern Lights. I think it's a bookstore.
Oh got it? Wink wink. Oh yeah, but where you
can where you can buy rush and spice books. Well,
(04:21):
I I don't understand. I'm just kidding. Let's see. Is
that like a code for something? Well, I thought you
were giving me the code, Chuck. I think it's a
real bookstore, gardening books. This is the most confused I've
ever been on this show. Like we're on a cell
phone and have to keep things, you know, straight up?
(04:42):
All right, all right, let's get back to it. I
don't want to confuse you so Auroras, because I want
to make sure that you is uh comes through Um
the the there are two and Chuck apparently until very
re cerently. It was assumed because people couldn't see him
(05:03):
at the same time, but it was assumed that there
the northern lights that you were seeing the Aurora borealis. Um,
if you could simultaneously see the Aurora Australias, you would
be seeing a mirror image of one another. And they
recently found out that that's absolutely not true at all.
They finally got someone down there to look some some
(05:25):
poor sap had to run. He's like, no, it's it's
way way too different. It's not the same. I don't
exactly know how they do it. They must have observed
it from space, but they saw They are convinced now
that it's not a mirror image any longer. Um. But
this is it's not that surprising that they're just now
kind of um figuring that out, because it wasn't until
(05:49):
too terribly long ago that people thought the aurora was
things like a giant camp fire on the other side
of the ocean being reflected in the sky or um uh,
you know, like the sun's rays peeking up from under
the earth where it was day when it was night
where you were. Um. There's been a lot of explanations,
(06:11):
some of them goofier than others. Um, But it wasn't
until I think the nineteenth century that we really figured
out what was going on. And it was a dude
in Norway, appropriately enough, because Norway is a good place
to see the Northern Lights. Yeah. I mean they've been
around obviously, since there have been people to watch them,
since ancient times, people have been observing them. But like
(06:32):
you said, when you know, when you're talking about indigenous
peoples and vikings and things, they're gonna have, uh, you know,
they had a more limited understanding of science, so they
had all these uh, fanciful descriptions of what they might be.
But um, are you talking about the first person to
use the term are you talking about? No? Actually I
(06:53):
jumped past him and he definitely deserves pop, so let's
talk about him. Yeah, Pierre Pierre Gasindi or Galileo and
Galileo Galilee apparently at the same around the same time,
both witnessed the September twelfth, nine sixty one display, and um,
both kind of you know, put it in their own
(07:13):
words how wonderful it was. But it wasn't until I
believe you were talking about eighteen physicist name Christian Birkeland
in Norway. Yeah, I think it was sixteen sixty one.
What did I say, Oh man, Yeah, okay, And they
(07:34):
saw it on Yeah, they saw it on the same night, right,
and they both went out and I don't think they
were having a conversation and then both ran out to
write it down. It seems like they simultaneously came up
with this idea at the same time from seeing it
on the same date. Is that is that correct? Yeah?
I think they both saw the same uh fantastic display
(07:57):
on the same night, but they both came up with
the same idea to name it Aurora Borealis. Oh. Well,
that I don't know. They share credit, which to me
means they probably don't know right and would just feel
bad giving it to one of them. Yeah, because history
has riddled with that kind of thing where you know,
(08:18):
everybody says, oh no, it was really Alexander Graham Bell
and Elijah Gray. There's definitely no winner in that. Or
maybe one of them said I say, Aurora, you say,
and he went Borealis and they had got a little
chant going. It was like a Beastie Boys concert. Yeah, exactly,
so they it was that the what was the Norwegian
(08:39):
scientists who Kidistian Berkeland. So they were already called the
Northern Lights from at least the Renaissance on um or
I guess that would be pre Renaissance, didn't Galileo helped
kick off the Renaissance. I think he cut the ribbon.
So um, Christian Berkeland he was the one who he
(08:59):
came up with the modern interpretation of what the auroras are. Yeah,
he was pretty right too, I agree, like he just
I don't know if he just pulled this one out
of his hat or what, but he definitely he he
decided that what the aurora auroras are aurora Apparently you
put it a E on the end, and that's how
(09:20):
you pluralize it. When um, he figured out that they
have something to do with electrons in outer space interacting
with the magnetosphere around Earth. And it turns out he
was absolutely right. Yeah, he recreated this in a vacuum
chamber successfully, but he wasn't a percent right he I
(09:43):
think he said that, um, and we'll get to this later,
but the Aurora borealis and auroras in general are have
a characteristic shape, which is an oval ring. And he
did not know this at the time, because he thought
that these electrons were coming from the sun, which is
not quite true. No, no, it's not. It's a little
(10:05):
more complex than that. Like, his interpretation of the whole
thing was pretty seemed to be correct, and you actually
run into it here there. I saw it on a
couple of pretty respectable sites that were basically giving the
Berkeland interpretation of aurora um phenomenon. But it turns out
there's an extra step in there that he didn't account for.
(10:26):
So do you want to talk about the magnetosphere real quick? Well,
I think quickly that we should shout out one more researcher. Uh.
And this was nineteen sixty four. There was a grad
student in Japan name Uh, Well you want to you
always take our Japanese you want to do that one? Uh?
Shoon Ichi Aka Sofu, very nice, thank you. Uh. And
he actually in nineteen sixty four saw these photos, examined them,
(10:49):
examined them closely, and notice that they were rings. And
I believe that he was the first one to say, hey,
these things are oval. I think he actually predicted them
that they would be oval mathematically without even observing him.
And then then yeah, then once we started going into
space and looking at from satellites. They said, yep, aka
(11:11):
Sofu was right through math dude. He was like, nope,
it'll be a ring. And it turns out he's right
and the the the So what you're seeing with the
northern lights and the southern lights, um are actually connections
toward ovals that go around the North pole and the
South pole. And what what it is again, it's it's particles,
(11:36):
highly charged particles from out of space interacting with the magnetosphere. Yeah.
So so you're ready to talk about the magnetosphere. So
the this is kind of astounding to me. We're not
entirely certain why the Earth has a magnetic field from
what I can tell. Did you know that? Yeah, I
(11:57):
mean they have their idea, but um, they're not positive right.
That astounds me. Um Supposedly from the rotation of molten
iron in the outer core inside the Earth, UM that
generates this electrical field that surrounds the Earth, the magnetosphere.
(12:18):
That's the current hypothesis. It's probably right, but the fact
that we don't know exactly what creates the magnetosphere around
the Earth is just weird to me. Yeah, I'm with
you there, So what with this whatever is causing it.
We know that there's a magnetic shield basically around Earth.
(12:38):
That's that is probably caused by that that iron rotating
inside the Earth. And this magnetic shield has helped preserve Earth,
like we would not be here if the magnetosphere wasn't there.
The atmosphere probably wouldn't be around Earth if the magnetosphere
wasn't there. It protects us from bursts of radiation of
highly charged um ions and and particles that are blasted
(13:04):
out from the Sun and are just traveling throughout the
Solar System from other stars and we're bombarded. Earth is
bombarded by the stuff constantly, and Um, the magnetosphere acts
to actually um deflect most of it, a lot of it. Yeah,
(13:26):
we need the magnetosphere. So we've got this thing surrounding
us and and it's great. It keeps us alive. But
it also creates the basis for um for Aurora aurora. Yes,
all right, so how this happens, um, It sounds kind
of complicated, but it's really not. When you look at it. UM, Like,
(13:48):
like you said, there's the Sun is like this big
ball of gas. It constantly spits out and burps out
all kinds of things in the form of energy and
um radiation and what's called the solar wind, solar flares,
coronal mass ejections. Uh. And we talked about all of
(14:08):
this in various episodes, but notably our terrible episode on
the Sun, our legendary episode. Anything that has anything remotely
to do with the Sun is usually a poor episode
for us. Uh. And, like you said, most of the
time these things get deflected, but sometimes some of the
stuff gets trapped in the magnetosphere, right, well, or so
(14:30):
this stuff that's being spit out from the Sun, it's
it's a lot of it's plasma, right, which is the
fourth state of matter. And that's like highly charged particles
that hit the magnetosphere. And when they hit the magnetosphere,
they basically transfer their current to the magnetosphere. They produced
an electrical charge in it. That's right, And all kinds
(14:52):
of fun stuff happens once that happens. And so what, well,
this is where the Berkland interpretation basically kind of starts
to diver It's right. So Berkland's idea was those particles
travel through the magnets for down the field lines of
the Earth's magnetic field and um. They directly create the
(15:14):
um the aurora. Yeah, Like if you looked at if
you could see the magnetic field around the Earth, it
would have a big, long whiskey tail sort of like
it would sort of look like a comet surrounding the
Earth and these magnetic lines that it travels. Once it
hits those field lines, it goes along that that path
on the northern and southern poles, right, so down that
(15:37):
tail and if you if you so, the reason that
it has that tail. On the one side, it's squished
and the the it's it goes it's about six to
eight earth radii outside of the Earth, in between the
Earth and the Sun, but it's being pressed up against
the Earth, threats being squished on the sun side. On
the night side, that tail is being formed, and apparently
(16:01):
that's extraordinarily long. It goes well well past the Moon,
something like up to a thousand earth radii past the
Earth on the other side. Right, But if there wasn't
solar wind and the Earth's magnetosphere just formed, I think
it's natural shape and there was no pressure from the
solar wind on it. What you would see if you
were looking at it from outer space is so the
(16:23):
Earth is a dipole magnet You've got the positive in
the negative one on each pole. Right, it would look
like the Earth's magnetosphere would look like an eight on
its side to where the top of the eight was
coming out the left side of the Earth and the
bottom of the eighth would be coming off of the
right side. There and where they came together would be
(16:45):
Earth's magnetic poles. And where those the magnetosphere comes in
contact with the Earth at the poles are what it
called the polar cusps. And apparently this is basically a
direct pipeline, a funnel for particles to go right toward
the polls. And that's why particles tend to accumulate, or
(17:06):
the northern lights tend to um accumulate and be seen
every night at these poles in rings, because they're being
funneled there by the magnetosphere. Yeah, it's like when uh
in the original Star Wars and New Hope when Luke
fires at the end toward the Death Star and it
and he gets sucked in that little hole that's like
the polar cusp of the Death Star. That is a
(17:27):
great analogy. So let's take a break, shall we. I'm
hanging on here by my fingernails, and I need to
regain myself. I think they call this a cliffhanger. All right,
(18:01):
so we're back to describe the second part of how
this works. Yes, and more. Uh So, when this charge
it's cutting across this magnetic field, following those lines toward
the it's actually called the magnet magneto tail. I can't
believe they actually named it that. It's great. Uh And
(18:23):
like you said from the beginning, it generates this electric
current and as it goes it generates more and more currents,
just sort of building up current until it hits the ionosphere. Right,
So here's this really important step, right, And berklen knew this.
He he guessed this, but he we'll we'll explain what
you got wrong after we explain what's right. How about that? So,
(18:43):
when um, these particles charge the magnetosphere, there's particles that
are already trapped in the the magnetosphere already, right, And
when solar winds and plasma and these highly charged particles
hit the magnetosphere and electrify it, it kind of shakes
(19:03):
loose these trapped particles, right. Yeah, Well, these trapped particles
are ions, meaning they have either an extra electron or
they're missing an electron, but either way they're not neutral.
They have a charge positive or negative charge. And those
things go careening through the magnetosphere toward Earth, down through
the atmosphere, and when they hit the atmosphere, they start
(19:26):
interacting with some of the atoms and molecules, specifically oxygen
and nitrogen in the Earth's atmosphere. And when they do, baby,
they release photons. That's right, And that that outer region,
the ionospheres where most of that oxygen and nitrogen is
and uh, you're right. They get together and have a
little bit of a party. They exchange some energy with
(19:48):
one another, uh, get to know one another a little bit.
And that absorption of energy by the oxygen and nitrogen
ions it gets those electrons, it gets their electrons excite it, right,
So they the um oxygen and nitrogen they have like uh,
they have electrons orbiting them, right, But they're just in
(20:09):
this low level orbit. It's like a whatever kind of energy, right,
it's a it's a party that hasn't started yet. It
is this is kind of hanging out. Maybe the pizza
hasn't arrived yet. Um, that kind of thing. So the
when the when the ions arrived though, they're bringing the pizza,
and then some they're bringing the northern lights with them, right, Um,
(20:29):
and they they get the party started, those electrons in
the lower orbit suddenly move up to a larger orbit
further out. And when that happens, energy has been gained. Right. Yeah,
that's called a high energy orbital Okay, So when that happens,
it's basically destined to come back to its lower energy orbit. Right.
(20:50):
The party has got to end at some point because
to get tired, they need to go home. The Sun's
coming up, that kind of thing. So either by it
changes in the vacuum state or because of the application
of an external electrical field that orbit, that electron goes
back to its original lower orbit. When it does, since
(21:11):
it's gained energy, and energy can neither be created nor destroyed. Um,
that has to go somewhere, And it goes somewhere by
the production or the emission I should say, of a photon,
a packet of light. So light is emitted when that
electron goes back down to its lower or after the
party's over, that's right. And because oxygen ions radiate red
(21:33):
and yellow light, nitrogen ions radiate red, blue, and violet light.
Depending on where you are, This can happen at different
UM I guess different altitudes. UH blue and violet UM
generally less than seventy two miles kilometers, green is going
to be sight milesight kilometers, and then redh more than
(21:58):
a hundred eight miles, which is about a hundred and
eighty kilometers, So that accounts for the different colors. If
you look up or if you've ever been lucky enough
to see one of the auroras um, either the Australias
or Borealis, you're gonna see My favorite is the green,
but you're gonna see all kinds of um, blue, green, violet,
and red lights. Well, and apparently the green just confounded
(22:21):
scientists because they're like, wait, so, yeah, oxygen radiates red
and yellow light. That's that's great. Nitrogen is is red,
blue and violet. Got that, But where is this green
coming from? They couldn't link at any particular atom or molecule,
and then they realized that it has to do with
the rarefied air in the upper upper atmosphere, that the
(22:43):
the conditions found up there are not going to be
found anywhere else on Earth. UM and that it's actually
it is oxygen atoms and oxygen molecules producing the green.
You just wouldn't see it anywhere else but specifically up
in the upper atmosphere. Yeah, well it's oxygen and nitrogen
doesn't have something to do with it. I saw it
was just oxygen emitting the green, Okay, but the I mean, yes,
(23:06):
nitrogen produces some of the other colors. Yeah. So, uh,
if you're watching these, if you're one of the people,
they very in brightness, you know they can right now.
And actually for a while now, we've been in a
pretty low uh what's it called the solar cycle. Yeah,
we've been in a kind of a bummer of a
solar cycle for a while now, and these auroras haven't
(23:29):
been nearly as spectacular as they have been in years
past because of that. I think they peaked in two
thousand and twelve, but even that that was a solar
maximum that when it peaked and it started to decline.
So solar cycle happens every eleven years, and we're starting
up our twenty third one now. Um, but this past one,
the twenty second one, was like the lowest in a century.
(23:52):
It was the weakest one in a cential. Yeah, the
weakest maximum even but even still weren't there. Couldn't you
see northern lights once in a while, like fairly far
a few years back. I don't remember. I stily here.
You can see it in or that at times, you
can see them in the southern United States, but I
don't remember seeing them ever. I don't either, And supposedly
there was a date in either or nine nine where
(24:14):
they were visible from Cuba that they were that far south.
That might be as far south as has ever been recorded. Actually,
but normally you can see them the closer to the
poles you are, so specifically, uh, in the North Pole
or South Pole, the Arctic or Antarctica, you can see
them basically every night. Um, there are specific conditions to
(24:36):
where they're more brilliant than others. Right, So, um, if
you're looking for what did you say, if people watch them,
they um they put them into categories one through four. Yeah.
I didn't say that yet, but uh yeah zero up
through four from barely can see it. Two Holy cow,
that's amazing, right, So if you're looking for the Holy Cow,
(24:58):
that's amazing. Four. Um, you would go looking on a
moonless night where there's no clouds where it's super super cold,
and maybe October or February or March. Yeah, I saw it. Also, Um,
winter is the best time to see him, winter in
the north and winter in the south. Oh yeah, yeah, alright,
(25:21):
well I'll buy that. Yeah. I thought that was weird
that there's any confusion on that, because yeah, there's like
whole tourist industries that are have grown up around us.
Well maybe that's how they're trying to get you. Like
it's December, but you should still come. It's great, all right,
you just come back in December too. Uh So, northern Norway,
UM Alaska. Obviously you're gonna get some pretty good stuff.
(25:44):
Um southern Alaska. Like you said, as things as you
go south, it's going to diminish a little bit. But
I would imagine southern Alaska you're still getting a pretty
good show, right, don't you think. Yep, Sometimes you could
see him and I think this will probably be on
par with southern Alaska. Just at the worst feeling, I'm
going to get a bunch of email geography. But you
(26:06):
can sometimes see them in Scotland even Okay, Um, I
believe that maybe the northern UK you could conceivably see
them once in a while. But I got the impression
that Scotland is more regular than say, over here in
the northern United States. Yeah, I think it says here
Scotland in the UK maybe one to ten times a month,
(26:29):
and then the US and Canada near the border maybe
just a couple to three or four times a year. Right, Okay,
I've never seen him of you know, and it says
once or twice a century. You might seem in the
southern United States. So if it happened in the late eighties,
we missed our shot, my friend, which is weird because
I would have been in Toledo. Maybe I was sleeping.
(26:53):
It just seems like something that my mom would have
woken me up for. Yeah, I mean, I don't it
doesn't stand out to me. Is like science teachers would
have probably said something. But remember remember Haley's comment. When
that came through, everybody was talking about Yeah, I guess
maybe it could have caught everybody by surprise. I don't
(27:15):
know about that. I think this is pretty predictable, right,
I don't know that that's true. What that is predictable? Yeah, well,
I think the the conditions, they know the conditions where
they will be the best. But maybe, like the weather,
you can't predict those conditions, right Suppose yeah I saw
somewhere something like, um, they can predict them within a
(27:38):
few hours. Oh well yeah, it's not enough time to
get to Norway. No it's not from Georgia. So so
the scale is zero to four it like we were saying.
And the people that enthusiasts that watch these they actually
can help contribute to science because you know, there's not
always someone like you said, if it's just a few hours, notice,
there's not always a scientist there when you need them. Um.
(28:00):
So these enthusiasts they record things, they record data, uh,
to turn in like the time and the date, the colors,
the latitude, and some might even make a little sketch
of what they're seeing. Uh. And that really goes a
long way to helping the scientists out and helping them understand, um,
what our magnetic field is doing right now. And the
(28:20):
scientists are like, we didn't ask for us. Get really
appreciate the extra touch. You know, maybe watercolors nice, Maybe
you put like a mint in the envelope to when
you veil it off, it would be nice. Why not
scientists love mints? Um apparently also, Chuck, something that was
in this article is that you can there are aurora
(28:42):
on other I'm just gonna say aurora's there are auroras
on other UM planets too. Yeah, you know, I kind
of wondered about that before I started researching, because, like
you know, solar flares and winds don't just go towards Earth,
and other planets have magnetic fields, so trurely this happens elsewhere,
and it does. They've seen it on Jupiter Saturn. Uh yeah,
(29:08):
Jupiter and Saturn, all right, but surely I mean, like
if it's if The point is, if you have a
magnetic field around the planet and an atmosphere around the
planet that has ionic gases, and and anytime there's a
solar flare that can reach it and UM create an
electrical current in that magnetosphere, then you have all the
(29:31):
conditions right for an aurora. I guess the colors will
be different though, on Jupiter and Saturn, right, because it's different.
That'd be awesome to see hydrogen and helium in their case.
So I'm not sure that's a Chartrusse and brown brown
aurora maybe not the best. So you want to take
another break and then uh finish up. Yes, I have
(29:51):
to have to wet down again. Okay, so chuck, um,
(30:18):
we didn't say a lot of the uh, the the
auroras that you see, um, they have they formed basically
different shapes, like it can come in different well, different
shapes around the poles. You've got the ovals, the rings,
but there's other shapes they can take two and some
of the more famous ones look like ribbons or curtains
(30:40):
that kind of go basically from one horizon all the
way to the other overhead. Uh and they going kind
of this wavy river pattern. But then the lights stands
upward into the atmosphere that it's got to be something
to see, you know. Yeah, I mean, after researching this,
I really like have a hankering to go see this
(31:01):
in person one day, so I did too, and I
still do. But I came across an article in The
Independent and it was written by one of the Independence
travel writers and they said that going to see the
Northern Lights was the most disappointing travel experience they have
ever had in their entire life. And she said that
part of it is what had to do with the
(31:24):
tour they went on. She said it sucked it was
a terrible tour Ronnie worst tour guide ever in the
Yelp review. Well, supposedly it was so this it was
a um they called them a northern lights chase. But
the chase consisted of sitting in their hosts living room
and then every once a while someone would go to
the window to see if the northern lights were out
(31:45):
or not, and then they'd sit back down. Um, that
was the chase. She said that there are that's a
dumb thing to call it. Well, it's not like it's
just over there. We just need to get a fast
enough truck. And apparently there are those like the was
kind of operations, and that's what she thought she was getting.
So she was had and on the one hand, but um,
(32:06):
she said, the actual northern lights that she saw were
kind of grayish and looked a lot like keim or
a contrail and or maybe even cigarettes smoke in the sky,
kind of fog at night. Um. And then Ronie was
just smoking. And then it wasn't. It wasn't until she
saw the picture that the host took of them with,
(32:28):
which requires like a long exposure, like ten to fourteen seconds.
That's when the colors and all the amazing nous comes out.
So everything you've seen in the pictures is from the
long exposure, and apparently in person it's very rare that
you see something that looks like the pictures. It looks
very much different in real life apparently, and that disappointing.
(32:52):
That's a huge bummer. But you just saved me like
ten grand, so that that is really disappointing. That's a
long exposure effect. Yes. For as far as the Independent
writer um says that she said when she saw the picture,
she was like, Oh, that's yeah, it's a it's a
photo that we're seeing. She said, in real life they
(33:12):
don't look like that. So the article you can read
it yourself. Why seeing the Northern Lights was the most
disappointing travel experience of my life, it was in the Independent.
I'm gonna change my whisch then I don't want to
pay to go on some dumb chase. I just want
to happen upon them on a regular trip somewhere there
(33:33):
you go. Then I'm already happy with Yeah, like Icelanders
And actually she she makes the same exact point. She said,
the rest of the trip was awesome. She said the
the I think she was in Norway, and she said
that the the just everything else about it was one
of the best trips she's ever been on. It was
the Northern Lights themselves that specifically stunk. And if you
(33:57):
make that, you know, part of your tour, but not
the whole reason you're going, you probably wouldn't be discipution
to to visit the far north of Norway. Well, because
I'm sure that's great on its own, you know, That's
what she was saying. Yeah, I mean, gosh, I'm scrolling
through the pictures now, it's amazing. That's uh. I thought
that's what it looked like, right, That's what everybody thinks, apparently,
(34:19):
but and sometimes I guess it does. But you are
extraordinarily lucky if you're seeing the Northern Lights and it
looks like that in person. From from what this lady
is saying. Well, plus, if you go on one of those,
there's nothing worse than feeling duped into and uh duped
into spending a lot of money on a tour. Yeah,
at some dude's house. Yeah, I'd like to see video.
(34:42):
That would be more telling. Yeah, I can't can't just
expose it like that with video, can you not? Well,
I mean you can open up the exposure to get
a two, get the video to look right, but it
won't be just like a you know, it's not like
open the exposure on uh, moving traffic at night with
(35:04):
a photograph and you'll see like the dragging of the
tail lights and stuff like that. Like it, it won't
create some weird effect. I wonder if you use like
a high speed filter it would do it? Or do
you want low speed high speed filter? You know, obviously
I'm I'm a professional photographer. Uh. Should we talk a
(35:25):
little bit about the sound. Yeah, definitely. It makes a
farting noise which is really interesting. Yea. And it kind
of smells that would make it all more fun at least. Um. No,
But there have long been people that um swore that
it makes a sound um and not everyone because apparently
and you know, someone actually found this out. It's a
(35:48):
sound that only some people can hear sometimes. Yeah, And
the conditions have to be super right for it, and
there's very specific ones. And there's this one poor guy,
his name is Unto kay Lane. He's finished, I belief.
Um he's an acoustic acoustician, is there right? Yeah? Um
(36:08):
from Finland who was on a camping trip, and I
think two thousand and the Northern lights were just going
off and going crazy, and he said he could hear
like popping and crackling sounds and everyone said, well, that's
because you were drunk, and he's like, no, I know
for a fact I heard this. So he spent like
the next fifteen years basically, um trying to capture the
(36:31):
sounds of the Aurora borealis, and he finally was successful
apparently in two thousand eleven. Yeah, and his whole deal was, UM, Well,
when he was with his friends, first of all, he said,
they had to be like completely still. It's not such
a noise that you know, they're having a conversation, and
they were like, oh, what's that like? They had to
(36:53):
be dead silent, They had to not move in order
to hear it. And then even within his group some
people couldn't hear it at all because it just very
low intensity. Right. But he's, like you said, been chasing
that buzz ever since. And um, finally is he figured
out I think he figured out the conditions first, right
(37:13):
or did he do that? Did he back it in afterward?
He he put two and two together. So we went
out and he captured it one night, right the sounds,
and then he went and looked up the UM like
I guess the weather services report for that local area,
and he figured out that what what he had been
(37:33):
sitting under is called a thermal inversion layer where UM
kind of warm at least compared to the air beneath
it on the ground. UM warm air is kind of
trapping the cold there below it, and as long as
the conditions are super still, uh, and it's very cold,
(37:54):
they're gonna stay separate, right, Yeah, it's gotta be clear,
calm and cold, right, So would just be just an
irregular aurora, Like you have to have a sub set
of conditions to get this crackle noise exactly right. So UM,
in the warm air, uh, the warm air layer, a
lot of UM electrons are become charged and the cold
(38:18):
are below it an opposite charge built, right, So you
have this this um electrical charge just waiting to go
off and turn into a current. And apparently it's the
aurora above it that that causes the charge to actually
turn into a current. Yeah, he was pretty surprised at
first because he didn't just point a microphone. He had
(38:39):
this array so he could triangulate exactly where the sound
was coming from, and it was just two thirty ft
above him was the sound and he was I don't
know what the finished expression for holy crap is it's
a oivey. I don't think so, but uh, that's what
he said. And he was like, you know this is weird,
this so low. Um, And that's when he came up
(39:02):
with his theory and it does it check out fully?
Or everybody said, you know, that's that's probably right. Yeah,
they're like head the very least came up with definitive
proof that this was um, the sound coming from it.
But yeah, the fact that it was just overhead this
in the thermal and vision layer explained how you could
(39:24):
conceivably hear the Northern Lights. Amazing, Yeah, pretty amazing. You
got anything else? I got nothing else. I'm just disappointed now, Yeah,
for real, I'm disappointed in the Northern Lights and our
episode on the Northern Lights. Uh if you yeah, man,
the sun, anytime the sun comes into play, it's a curse,
(39:45):
a pox on us. If you want to know more
about the Northern Lights, go see him yourself. And if
you have seen them in person and know us to
be incorrect. Let us know because we would like our
dreams back. Um. You can tweet to us at s
SK podcast or josh um Clark. You can hang out
with us on Facebook at Stuff you Should Know or
(40:07):
Charles W. Chuck Bryant. You can send us an email
the Stuff podcast at how Stuff works dot com. And
as always, I started this one early which goes to
show again, worst episode over, It's time for listener mail.
That's right, I'm gonna call this. Uh well, it's just
(40:31):
a nice email. Hey, guys, been a fan since two
thousand and ten, when I was a freshman in college.
I don't think I've ever written in though uh this
entire time, have been an evangelist, but to no avail.
That all change A few months ago I convinced the
love of my life, Meredith, to give you guys a shot,
And now she is fun too. She's an outstanding woman
and mother and has courageously struck out a loan for
(40:52):
a job offer she couldn't refuse. So now we live
four hundred miles apart, and having your podcast to talk
about keeps a conversation alive on day some weird feeling
a bit down? Uh, I know, it's nice. In addition,
I will also listen to you guys in the long
car rides to visit her. There's a way to distract
myself from my own excitement about getting to see her again,
and it helps the time pass faster. Uh. I know
(41:14):
it's not the first time someone's written to tell you
the same thing, and I promise I would never be
that listener. But I get it now, and when you
find it true love, you just cannot help yourself. Sometimes
this does get the coveted shout out. Tell Meredith to
keep up the good work and Happy Mother's Day. Keep
up the good work, guys. You were the first podcast
I ever listened to and still my favorite. Sleep well
(41:35):
tonight knowing that you are fostering love and real human
connections out here in podcast land. That was a great email.
That was nice. That is from Sam Martin and oh maha,
he's a medical student and a bar trivia master. Thanks
to us, he said, nice. Well, thanks a lot, Sam, Yes, Sam,
and Mereth, thanks a lot Meredith for giving us a shot.
(41:56):
We're glad it paid off. It reminds me of me
and youm do long distance for a while. It can
really really suck. Remember that you guys got through that
like a champ, though we did like two chaps. Yeah,
we've petted each other on the backs. If you want
to get in touch with us, you already know how
because I said it prematurely. Uh. And in the meantime
(42:17):
you can hang out with us. Uh. It's stuff you
should know. Dot com for more on this and thousands
of other topics. Is it how stuff works? Dot com
Welcome to Stuff You Should Know from how Stuff Works
dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark,
There's Charles w Chuck Bryant, and Jerry's over there. So
this is Stuff you Should Know the podcast. Uh, we
(00:24):
want to give before we get started, a big congratulations
to our newest colleagues, Emily and Bridget with the official
relaunch of stuff Mom never told you, Yeah, Chuck. They
just debuted last week, I believe, and they come out
Wednesdays and Fridays. Huh yeah, so Monday, Tuesday, well, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday,
(00:47):
the four of us have you covered? Yeah, it's true.
Do we have any shows that come out on Monday?
We do? All right, Well, Jerry's nodding, so that means
we've got you covered every day of the week. Let's
just say that. Nice. That's the How Stuff Works way. Yeah. Yeah, anyway,
just congratulations to them. That's awesome. I know that they've
been running classic episodes while they were down and getting restarted,
(01:08):
and uh it's no small thing to come in and
take a show over. But they're doing an awesome job
and are both uh great broadcasters. And you know, I'm
I'm in support of them. Yeah, that's my official position.
I know that sounded weirdly political. Yeah, good luck and
best twishes to Bridget and Emily. So you guys go
(01:29):
check it out Wednesdays and Fridays anywhere you get podcasts.
You can get stuff Mom never told you. Yes, and apologize.
I apologize for my voice. Oh yeah, what's up with
your voice? Man? I've just had this upper respiratory thing
that won't go away, that stinks, and so unless I'm
constantly wetting my throat, it gets weirdly deep and cracky.
(01:51):
So are you paying a lot more than usual? Well,
I'm drinking a lot of water. I'm peeing a lot,
but I would literally have to drink between every sentence
to keep it silky smooth. Oh do you want to
record today? No, I'm fine. I'm not in pain, but
I just don't want anyone's ears to be in pain.
Have you heard of um? Oh? Man, now that I
(02:11):
say it, I realized I don't know the name of
the brand. But you know those like cough drops that
are actually like candy, but they market them as cough drops,
the cherry flavored ones. M No, I mean like they're
literal candy. Um no, but it's basically the most delicious
jolly rancher you've ever had. It lacks the sour, it's
(02:34):
all sweet. So it's green apple. No, they're red. I
can't remember what they're called. People are screaming at their um. Yeah,
well their phones, their tablets, their computers. Right now, settled down, everybody, Yes,
we chuck and I agree with you. This is maybe
the worst intro we've ever done. And Jerry does too.
(02:54):
So let's get to it, shall we. So we're talking
aurora's today. Yeah, and generally we're talking about the two
most famous auroras. Uh And I say too, because I
don't even want to give I don't want to short
change the Aurora Australis. No, it definitely does get short changed,
(03:14):
though totally. Did you Did you come upon why? I
came upon the explanation a couple of times? Oh about why? Yeah?
Uh I didn't. But I'm gonna have a guess. Okay,
let's have it. Is it not quite as magnificent? Nope?
Are there not as many people there? Yes? There you go,
There are fewer. There's there's less land around the South
(03:38):
Pole as there is around the North Pole. Um, I
should say the magnetic South and North pole. Um. So
there's fewer eyes to see it, so the grandeur of
it is is um less obvious too as many people.
But yeah, that's that's why the Northern Lights get all
the all the top billing. Plus, no one ever named
a strain of weed after the Aurora Australis out about
(04:00):
that too. Southern Lights, what is that? I bet you
there's one. There's a poison. There a like a head
shop in Atlanta called Southern Lights. I think it's a bookstore.
Oh got it? Wink wink. Oh yeah, but where you
can where you can buy rush and spice books. Well,
(04:21):
I I don't understand. I'm just kidding. Let's see. Is
that like a code for something? Well, I thought you
were giving me the code, Chuck. I think it's a
real bookstore, gardening books. This is the most confused I've
ever been on this show. Like we're on a cell
phone and have to keep things, you know, straight up?
(04:42):
All right, all right, let's get back to it. I
don't want to confuse you so Auroras, because I want
to make sure that you is uh comes through Um
the the there are two and Chuck apparently until very
re cerently. It was assumed because people couldn't see him
(05:03):
at the same time, but it was assumed that there
the northern lights that you were seeing the Aurora borealis. Um,
if you could simultaneously see the Aurora Australias, you would
be seeing a mirror image of one another. And they
recently found out that that's absolutely not true at all.
They finally got someone down there to look some some
(05:25):
poor sap had to run. He's like, no, it's it's
way way too different. It's not the same. I don't
exactly know how they do it. They must have observed
it from space, but they saw They are convinced now
that it's not a mirror image any longer. Um. But
this is it's not that surprising that they're just now
kind of um figuring that out, because it wasn't until
(05:49):
too terribly long ago that people thought the aurora was
things like a giant camp fire on the other side
of the ocean being reflected in the sky or um uh,
you know, like the sun's rays peeking up from under
the earth where it was day when it was night
where you were. Um. There's been a lot of explanations,
(06:11):
some of them goofier than others. Um, But it wasn't
until I think the nineteenth century that we really figured
out what was going on. And it was a dude
in Norway, appropriately enough, because Norway is a good place
to see the Northern Lights. Yeah. I mean they've been
around obviously, since there have been people to watch them,
since ancient times, people have been observing them. But like
(06:32):
you said, when you know, when you're talking about indigenous
peoples and vikings and things, they're gonna have, uh, you know,
they had a more limited understanding of science, so they
had all these uh, fanciful descriptions of what they might be.
But um, are you talking about the first person to
use the term are you talking about? No? Actually I
(06:53):
jumped past him and he definitely deserves pop, so let's
talk about him. Yeah, Pierre Pierre Gasindi or Galileo and
Galileo Galilee apparently at the same around the same time,
both witnessed the September twelfth, nine sixty one display, and um,
both kind of you know, put it in their own
(07:13):
words how wonderful it was. But it wasn't until I
believe you were talking about eighteen physicist name Christian Birkeland
in Norway. Yeah, I think it was sixteen sixty one.
What did I say, Oh man, Yeah, okay, And they
(07:34):
saw it on Yeah, they saw it on the same night, right,
and they both went out and I don't think they
were having a conversation and then both ran out to
write it down. It seems like they simultaneously came up
with this idea at the same time from seeing it
on the same date. Is that is that correct? Yeah?
I think they both saw the same uh fantastic display
(07:57):
on the same night, but they both came up with
the same idea to name it Aurora Borealis. Oh. Well,
that I don't know. They share credit, which to me
means they probably don't know right and would just feel
bad giving it to one of them. Yeah, because history
has riddled with that kind of thing where you know,
(08:18):
everybody says, oh no, it was really Alexander Graham Bell
and Elijah Gray. There's definitely no winner in that. Or
maybe one of them said I say, Aurora, you say,
and he went Borealis and they had got a little
chant going. It was like a Beastie Boys concert. Yeah, exactly,
so they it was that the what was the Norwegian
(08:39):
scientists who Kidistian Berkeland. So they were already called the
Northern Lights from at least the Renaissance on um or
I guess that would be pre Renaissance, didn't Galileo helped
kick off the Renaissance. I think he cut the ribbon.
So um, Christian Berkeland he was the one who he
(08:59):
came up with the modern interpretation of what the auroras are. Yeah,
he was pretty right too, I agree, like he just
I don't know if he just pulled this one out
of his hat or what, but he definitely he he
decided that what the aurora auroras are aurora Apparently you
put it a E on the end, and that's how
(09:20):
you pluralize it. When um, he figured out that they
have something to do with electrons in outer space interacting
with the magnetosphere around Earth. And it turns out he
was absolutely right. Yeah, he recreated this in a vacuum
chamber successfully, but he wasn't a percent right he I
(09:43):
think he said that, um, and we'll get to this later,
but the Aurora borealis and auroras in general are have
a characteristic shape, which is an oval ring. And he
did not know this at the time, because he thought
that these electrons were coming from the sun, which is
not quite true. No, no, it's not. It's a little
(10:05):
more complex than that. Like, his interpretation of the whole
thing was pretty seemed to be correct, and you actually
run into it here there. I saw it on a
couple of pretty respectable sites that were basically giving the
Berkeland interpretation of aurora um phenomenon. But it turns out
there's an extra step in there that he didn't account for.
(10:26):
So do you want to talk about the magnetosphere real quick? Well,
I think quickly that we should shout out one more researcher. Uh.
And this was nineteen sixty four. There was a grad
student in Japan name Uh, Well you want to you
always take our Japanese you want to do that one? Uh?
Shoon Ichi Aka Sofu, very nice, thank you. Uh. And
he actually in nineteen sixty four saw these photos, examined them,
(10:49):
examined them closely, and notice that they were rings. And
I believe that he was the first one to say, hey,
these things are oval. I think he actually predicted them
that they would be oval mathematically without even observing him.
And then then yeah, then once we started going into
space and looking at from satellites. They said, yep, aka
(11:11):
Sofu was right through math dude. He was like, nope,
it'll be a ring. And it turns out he's right
and the the the So what you're seeing with the
northern lights and the southern lights, um are actually connections
toward ovals that go around the North pole and the
South pole. And what what it is again, it's it's particles,
(11:36):
highly charged particles from out of space interacting with the magnetosphere. Yeah.
So so you're ready to talk about the magnetosphere. So
the this is kind of astounding to me. We're not
entirely certain why the Earth has a magnetic field from
what I can tell. Did you know that? Yeah, I
(11:57):
mean they have their idea, but um, they're not positive right.
That astounds me. Um Supposedly from the rotation of molten
iron in the outer core inside the Earth, UM that
generates this electrical field that surrounds the Earth, the magnetosphere.
(12:18):
That's the current hypothesis. It's probably right, but the fact
that we don't know exactly what creates the magnetosphere around
the Earth is just weird to me. Yeah, I'm with
you there, So what with this whatever is causing it.
We know that there's a magnetic shield basically around Earth.
(12:38):
That's that is probably caused by that that iron rotating
inside the Earth. And this magnetic shield has helped preserve Earth,
like we would not be here if the magnetosphere wasn't there.
The atmosphere probably wouldn't be around Earth if the magnetosphere
wasn't there. It protects us from bursts of radiation of
highly charged um ions and and particles that are blasted
(13:04):
out from the Sun and are just traveling throughout the
Solar System from other stars and we're bombarded. Earth is
bombarded by the stuff constantly, and Um, the magnetosphere acts
to actually um deflect most of it, a lot of it. Yeah,
(13:26):
we need the magnetosphere. So we've got this thing surrounding
us and and it's great. It keeps us alive. But
it also creates the basis for um for Aurora aurora. Yes,
all right, so how this happens, um, It sounds kind
of complicated, but it's really not. When you look at it. UM, Like,
(13:48):
like you said, there's the Sun is like this big
ball of gas. It constantly spits out and burps out
all kinds of things in the form of energy and
um radiation and what's called the solar wind, solar flares,
coronal mass ejections. Uh. And we talked about all of
(14:08):
this in various episodes, but notably our terrible episode on
the Sun, our legendary episode. Anything that has anything remotely
to do with the Sun is usually a poor episode
for us. Uh. And, like you said, most of the
time these things get deflected, but sometimes some of the
stuff gets trapped in the magnetosphere, right, well, or so
(14:30):
this stuff that's being spit out from the Sun, it's
it's a lot of it's plasma, right, which is the
fourth state of matter. And that's like highly charged particles
that hit the magnetosphere. And when they hit the magnetosphere,
they basically transfer their current to the magnetosphere. They produced
an electrical charge in it. That's right, And all kinds
(14:52):
of fun stuff happens once that happens. And so what, well,
this is where the Berkland interpretation basically kind of starts
to diver It's right. So Berkland's idea was those particles
travel through the magnets for down the field lines of
the Earth's magnetic field and um. They directly create the
(15:14):
um the aurora. Yeah, Like if you looked at if
you could see the magnetic field around the Earth, it
would have a big, long whiskey tail sort of like
it would sort of look like a comet surrounding the
Earth and these magnetic lines that it travels. Once it
hits those field lines, it goes along that that path
on the northern and southern poles, right, so down that
(15:37):
tail and if you if you so, the reason that
it has that tail. On the one side, it's squished
and the the it's it goes it's about six to
eight earth radii outside of the Earth, in between the
Earth and the Sun, but it's being pressed up against
the Earth, threats being squished on the sun side. On
the night side, that tail is being formed, and apparently
(16:01):
that's extraordinarily long. It goes well well past the Moon,
something like up to a thousand earth radii past the
Earth on the other side. Right, But if there wasn't
solar wind and the Earth's magnetosphere just formed, I think
it's natural shape and there was no pressure from the
solar wind on it. What you would see if you
were looking at it from outer space is so the
(16:23):
Earth is a dipole magnet You've got the positive in
the negative one on each pole. Right, it would look
like the Earth's magnetosphere would look like an eight on
its side to where the top of the eight was
coming out the left side of the Earth and the
bottom of the eighth would be coming off of the
right side. There and where they came together would be
(16:45):
Earth's magnetic poles. And where those the magnetosphere comes in
contact with the Earth at the poles are what it
called the polar cusps. And apparently this is basically a
direct pipeline, a funnel for particles to go right toward
the polls. And that's why particles tend to accumulate, or
(17:06):
the northern lights tend to um accumulate and be seen
every night at these poles in rings, because they're being
funneled there by the magnetosphere. Yeah, it's like when uh
in the original Star Wars and New Hope when Luke
fires at the end toward the Death Star and it
and he gets sucked in that little hole that's like
the polar cusp of the Death Star. That is a
(17:27):
great analogy. So let's take a break, shall we. I'm
hanging on here by my fingernails, and I need to
regain myself. I think they call this a cliffhanger. All right,
(18:01):
so we're back to describe the second part of how
this works. Yes, and more. Uh So, when this charge
it's cutting across this magnetic field, following those lines toward
the it's actually called the magnet magneto tail. I can't
believe they actually named it that. It's great. Uh And
(18:23):
like you said from the beginning, it generates this electric
current and as it goes it generates more and more currents,
just sort of building up current until it hits the ionosphere. Right,
So here's this really important step, right, And berklen knew this.
He he guessed this, but he we'll we'll explain what
you got wrong after we explain what's right. How about that? So,
(18:43):
when um, these particles charge the magnetosphere, there's particles that
are already trapped in the the magnetosphere already, right, And
when solar winds and plasma and these highly charged particles
hit the magnetosphere and electrify it, it kind of shakes
(19:03):
loose these trapped particles, right. Yeah, Well, these trapped particles
are ions, meaning they have either an extra electron or
they're missing an electron, but either way they're not neutral.
They have a charge positive or negative charge. And those
things go careening through the magnetosphere toward Earth, down through
the atmosphere, and when they hit the atmosphere, they start
(19:26):
interacting with some of the atoms and molecules, specifically oxygen
and nitrogen in the Earth's atmosphere. And when they do, baby,
they release photons. That's right, And that that outer region,
the ionospheres where most of that oxygen and nitrogen is
and uh, you're right. They get together and have a
little bit of a party. They exchange some energy with
(19:48):
one another, uh, get to know one another a little bit.
And that absorption of energy by the oxygen and nitrogen
ions it gets those electrons, it gets their electrons excite it, right,
So they the um oxygen and nitrogen they have like uh,
they have electrons orbiting them, right, But they're just in
(20:09):
this low level orbit. It's like a whatever kind of energy, right,
it's a it's a party that hasn't started yet. It
is this is kind of hanging out. Maybe the pizza
hasn't arrived yet. Um, that kind of thing. So the
when the when the ions arrived though, they're bringing the pizza,
and then some they're bringing the northern lights with them, right, Um,
(20:29):
and they they get the party started, those electrons in
the lower orbit suddenly move up to a larger orbit
further out. And when that happens, energy has been gained. Right. Yeah,
that's called a high energy orbital Okay, So when that happens,
it's basically destined to come back to its lower energy orbit. Right.
(20:50):
The party has got to end at some point because
to get tired, they need to go home. The Sun's
coming up, that kind of thing. So either by it
changes in the vacuum state or because of the application
of an external electrical field that orbit, that electron goes
back to its original lower orbit. When it does, since
(21:11):
it's gained energy, and energy can neither be created nor destroyed. Um,
that has to go somewhere, And it goes somewhere by
the production or the emission I should say, of a photon,
a packet of light. So light is emitted when that
electron goes back down to its lower or after the
party's over, that's right. And because oxygen ions radiate red
(21:33):
and yellow light, nitrogen ions radiate red, blue, and violet light.
Depending on where you are, This can happen at different
UM I guess different altitudes. UH blue and violet UM
generally less than seventy two miles kilometers, green is going
to be sight milesight kilometers, and then redh more than
(21:58):
a hundred eight miles, which is about a hundred and
eighty kilometers, So that accounts for the different colors. If
you look up or if you've ever been lucky enough
to see one of the auroras um, either the Australias
or Borealis, you're gonna see My favorite is the green,
but you're gonna see all kinds of um, blue, green, violet,
and red lights. Well, and apparently the green just confounded
(22:21):
scientists because they're like, wait, so, yeah, oxygen radiates red
and yellow light. That's that's great. Nitrogen is is red,
blue and violet. Got that, But where is this green
coming from? They couldn't link at any particular atom or molecule,
and then they realized that it has to do with
the rarefied air in the upper upper atmosphere, that the
(22:43):
the conditions found up there are not going to be
found anywhere else on Earth. UM and that it's actually
it is oxygen atoms and oxygen molecules producing the green.
You just wouldn't see it anywhere else but specifically up
in the upper atmosphere. Yeah, well it's oxygen and nitrogen
doesn't have something to do with it. I saw it
was just oxygen emitting the green, Okay, but the I mean, yes,
(23:06):
nitrogen produces some of the other colors. Yeah. So, uh,
if you're watching these, if you're one of the people,
they very in brightness, you know they can right now.
And actually for a while now, we've been in a
pretty low uh what's it called the solar cycle. Yeah,
we've been in a kind of a bummer of a
solar cycle for a while now, and these auroras haven't
(23:29):
been nearly as spectacular as they have been in years
past because of that. I think they peaked in two
thousand and twelve, but even that that was a solar
maximum that when it peaked and it started to decline.
So solar cycle happens every eleven years, and we're starting
up our twenty third one now. Um, but this past one,
the twenty second one, was like the lowest in a century.
(23:52):
It was the weakest one in a cential. Yeah, the
weakest maximum even but even still weren't there. Couldn't you
see northern lights once in a while, like fairly far
a few years back. I don't remember. I stily here.
You can see it in or that at times, you
can see them in the southern United States, but I
don't remember seeing them ever. I don't either, And supposedly
there was a date in either or nine nine where
(24:14):
they were visible from Cuba that they were that far south.
That might be as far south as has ever been recorded. Actually,
but normally you can see them the closer to the
poles you are, so specifically, uh, in the North Pole
or South Pole, the Arctic or Antarctica, you can see
them basically every night. Um, there are specific conditions to
(24:36):
where they're more brilliant than others. Right, So, um, if
you're looking for what did you say, if people watch them,
they um they put them into categories one through four. Yeah.
I didn't say that yet, but uh yeah zero up
through four from barely can see it. Two Holy cow,
that's amazing, right, So if you're looking for the Holy Cow,
(24:58):
that's amazing. Four. Um, you would go looking on a
moonless night where there's no clouds where it's super super cold,
and maybe October or February or March. Yeah, I saw it. Also, Um,
winter is the best time to see him, winter in
the north and winter in the south. Oh yeah, yeah, alright,
(25:21):
well I'll buy that. Yeah. I thought that was weird
that there's any confusion on that, because yeah, there's like
whole tourist industries that are have grown up around us.
Well maybe that's how they're trying to get you. Like
it's December, but you should still come. It's great, all right,
you just come back in December too. Uh So, northern Norway,
UM Alaska. Obviously you're gonna get some pretty good stuff.
(25:44):
Um southern Alaska. Like you said, as things as you
go south, it's going to diminish a little bit. But
I would imagine southern Alaska you're still getting a pretty
good show, right, don't you think. Yep, Sometimes you could
see him and I think this will probably be on
par with southern Alaska. Just at the worst feeling, I'm
going to get a bunch of email geography. But you
(26:06):
can sometimes see them in Scotland even Okay, Um, I
believe that maybe the northern UK you could conceivably see
them once in a while. But I got the impression
that Scotland is more regular than say, over here in
the northern United States. Yeah, I think it says here
Scotland in the UK maybe one to ten times a month,
(26:29):
and then the US and Canada near the border maybe
just a couple to three or four times a year. Right, Okay,
I've never seen him of you know, and it says
once or twice a century. You might seem in the
southern United States. So if it happened in the late eighties,
we missed our shot, my friend, which is weird because
I would have been in Toledo. Maybe I was sleeping.
(26:53):
It just seems like something that my mom would have
woken me up for. Yeah, I mean, I don't it
doesn't stand out to me. Is like science teachers would
have probably said something. But remember remember Haley's comment. When
that came through, everybody was talking about Yeah, I guess
maybe it could have caught everybody by surprise. I don't
(27:15):
know about that. I think this is pretty predictable, right,
I don't know that that's true. What that is predictable? Yeah, well,
I think the the conditions, they know the conditions where
they will be the best. But maybe, like the weather,
you can't predict those conditions, right Suppose yeah I saw
somewhere something like, um, they can predict them within a
(27:38):
few hours. Oh well yeah, it's not enough time to
get to Norway. No it's not from Georgia. So so
the scale is zero to four it like we were saying.
And the people that enthusiasts that watch these they actually
can help contribute to science because you know, there's not
always someone like you said, if it's just a few hours, notice,
there's not always a scientist there when you need them. Um.
(28:00):
So these enthusiasts they record things, they record data, uh,
to turn in like the time and the date, the colors,
the latitude, and some might even make a little sketch
of what they're seeing. Uh. And that really goes a
long way to helping the scientists out and helping them understand, um,
what our magnetic field is doing right now. And the
(28:20):
scientists are like, we didn't ask for us. Get really
appreciate the extra touch. You know, maybe watercolors nice, Maybe
you put like a mint in the envelope to when
you veil it off, it would be nice. Why not
scientists love mints? Um apparently also, Chuck, something that was
in this article is that you can there are aurora
(28:42):
on other I'm just gonna say aurora's there are auroras
on other UM planets too. Yeah, you know, I kind
of wondered about that before I started researching, because, like
you know, solar flares and winds don't just go towards Earth,
and other planets have magnetic fields, so trurely this happens elsewhere,
and it does. They've seen it on Jupiter Saturn. Uh yeah,
(29:08):
Jupiter and Saturn, all right, but surely I mean, like
if it's if The point is, if you have a
magnetic field around the planet and an atmosphere around the
planet that has ionic gases, and and anytime there's a
solar flare that can reach it and UM create an
electrical current in that magnetosphere, then you have all the
(29:31):
conditions right for an aurora. I guess the colors will
be different though, on Jupiter and Saturn, right, because it's different.
That'd be awesome to see hydrogen and helium in their case.
So I'm not sure that's a Chartrusse and brown brown
aurora maybe not the best. So you want to take
another break and then uh finish up. Yes, I have
(29:51):
to have to wet down again. Okay, so chuck, um,
(30:18):
we didn't say a lot of the uh, the the
auroras that you see, um, they have they formed basically
different shapes, like it can come in different well, different
shapes around the poles. You've got the ovals, the rings,
but there's other shapes they can take two and some
of the more famous ones look like ribbons or curtains
(30:40):
that kind of go basically from one horizon all the
way to the other overhead. Uh and they going kind
of this wavy river pattern. But then the lights stands
upward into the atmosphere that it's got to be something
to see, you know. Yeah, I mean, after researching this,
I really like have a hankering to go see this
(31:01):
in person one day, so I did too, and I
still do. But I came across an article in The
Independent and it was written by one of the Independence
travel writers and they said that going to see the
Northern Lights was the most disappointing travel experience they have
ever had in their entire life. And she said that
part of it is what had to do with the
(31:24):
tour they went on. She said it sucked it was
a terrible tour Ronnie worst tour guide ever in the
Yelp review. Well, supposedly it was so this it was
a um they called them a northern lights chase. But
the chase consisted of sitting in their hosts living room
and then every once a while someone would go to
the window to see if the northern lights were out
(31:45):
or not, and then they'd sit back down. Um, that
was the chase. She said that there are that's a
dumb thing to call it. Well, it's not like it's
just over there. We just need to get a fast
enough truck. And apparently there are those like the was
kind of operations, and that's what she thought she was getting.
So she was had and on the one hand, but um,
(32:06):
she said, the actual northern lights that she saw were
kind of grayish and looked a lot like keim or
a contrail and or maybe even cigarettes smoke in the sky,
kind of fog at night. Um. And then Ronie was
just smoking. And then it wasn't. It wasn't until she
saw the picture that the host took of them with,
(32:28):
which requires like a long exposure, like ten to fourteen seconds.
That's when the colors and all the amazing nous comes out.
So everything you've seen in the pictures is from the
long exposure, and apparently in person it's very rare that
you see something that looks like the pictures. It looks
very much different in real life apparently, and that disappointing.
(32:52):
That's a huge bummer. But you just saved me like
ten grand, so that that is really disappointing. That's a
long exposure effect. Yes. For as far as the Independent
writer um says that she said when she saw the picture,
she was like, Oh, that's yeah, it's a it's a
photo that we're seeing. She said, in real life they
(33:12):
don't look like that. So the article you can read
it yourself. Why seeing the Northern Lights was the most
disappointing travel experience of my life, it was in the Independent.
I'm gonna change my whisch then I don't want to
pay to go on some dumb chase. I just want
to happen upon them on a regular trip somewhere there
(33:33):
you go. Then I'm already happy with Yeah, like Icelanders
And actually she she makes the same exact point. She said,
the rest of the trip was awesome. She said the
the I think she was in Norway, and she said
that the the just everything else about it was one
of the best trips she's ever been on. It was
the Northern Lights themselves that specifically stunk. And if you
(33:57):
make that, you know, part of your tour, but not
the whole reason you're going, you probably wouldn't be discipution
to to visit the far north of Norway. Well, because
I'm sure that's great on its own, you know, That's
what she was saying. Yeah, I mean, gosh, I'm scrolling
through the pictures now, it's amazing. That's uh. I thought
that's what it looked like, right, That's what everybody thinks, apparently,
(34:19):
but and sometimes I guess it does. But you are
extraordinarily lucky if you're seeing the Northern Lights and it
looks like that in person. From from what this lady
is saying. Well, plus, if you go on one of those,
there's nothing worse than feeling duped into and uh duped
into spending a lot of money on a tour. Yeah,
at some dude's house. Yeah, I'd like to see video.
(34:42):
That would be more telling. Yeah, I can't can't just
expose it like that with video, can you not? Well,
I mean you can open up the exposure to get
a two, get the video to look right, but it
won't be just like a you know, it's not like
open the exposure on uh, moving traffic at night with
(35:04):
a photograph and you'll see like the dragging of the
tail lights and stuff like that. Like it, it won't
create some weird effect. I wonder if you use like
a high speed filter it would do it? Or do
you want low speed high speed filter? You know, obviously
I'm I'm a professional photographer. Uh. Should we talk a
(35:25):
little bit about the sound. Yeah, definitely. It makes a
farting noise which is really interesting. Yea. And it kind
of smells that would make it all more fun at least. Um. No,
But there have long been people that um swore that
it makes a sound um and not everyone because apparently
and you know, someone actually found this out. It's a
(35:48):
sound that only some people can hear sometimes. Yeah, And
the conditions have to be super right for it, and
there's very specific ones. And there's this one poor guy,
his name is Unto kay Lane. He's finished, I belief.
Um he's an acoustic acoustician, is there right? Yeah? Um
(36:08):
from Finland who was on a camping trip, and I
think two thousand and the Northern lights were just going
off and going crazy, and he said he could hear
like popping and crackling sounds and everyone said, well, that's
because you were drunk, and he's like, no, I know
for a fact I heard this. So he spent like
the next fifteen years basically, um trying to capture the
(36:31):
sounds of the Aurora borealis, and he finally was successful
apparently in two thousand eleven. Yeah, and his whole deal was, UM, Well,
when he was with his friends, first of all, he said,
they had to be like completely still. It's not such
a noise that you know, they're having a conversation, and
they were like, oh, what's that like? They had to
(36:53):
be dead silent, They had to not move in order
to hear it. And then even within his group some
people couldn't hear it at all because it just very
low intensity. Right. But he's, like you said, been chasing
that buzz ever since. And um, finally is he figured
out I think he figured out the conditions first, right
(37:13):
or did he do that? Did he back it in afterward?
He he put two and two together. So we went
out and he captured it one night, right the sounds,
and then he went and looked up the UM like
I guess the weather services report for that local area,
and he figured out that what what he had been
(37:33):
sitting under is called a thermal inversion layer where UM
kind of warm at least compared to the air beneath
it on the ground. UM warm air is kind of
trapping the cold there below it, and as long as
the conditions are super still, uh, and it's very cold,
(37:54):
they're gonna stay separate, right, Yeah, it's gotta be clear,
calm and cold, right, So would just be just an
irregular aurora, Like you have to have a sub set
of conditions to get this crackle noise exactly right. So UM,
in the warm air, uh, the warm air layer, a
lot of UM electrons are become charged and the cold
(38:18):
are below it an opposite charge built, right, So you
have this this um electrical charge just waiting to go
off and turn into a current. And apparently it's the
aurora above it that that causes the charge to actually
turn into a current. Yeah, he was pretty surprised at
first because he didn't just point a microphone. He had
(38:39):
this array so he could triangulate exactly where the sound
was coming from, and it was just two thirty ft
above him was the sound and he was I don't
know what the finished expression for holy crap is it's
a oivey. I don't think so, but uh, that's what
he said. And he was like, you know this is weird,
this so low. Um, And that's when he came up
(39:02):
with his theory and it does it check out fully?
Or everybody said, you know, that's that's probably right. Yeah,
they're like head the very least came up with definitive
proof that this was um, the sound coming from it.
But yeah, the fact that it was just overhead this
in the thermal and vision layer explained how you could
(39:24):
conceivably hear the Northern Lights. Amazing, Yeah, pretty amazing. You
got anything else? I got nothing else. I'm just disappointed now, Yeah,
for real, I'm disappointed in the Northern Lights and our
episode on the Northern Lights. Uh if you yeah, man,
the sun, anytime the sun comes into play, it's a curse,
(39:45):
a pox on us. If you want to know more
about the Northern Lights, go see him yourself. And if
you have seen them in person and know us to
be incorrect. Let us know because we would like our
dreams back. Um. You can tweet to us at s
SK podcast or josh um Clark. You can hang out
with us on Facebook at Stuff you Should Know or
(40:07):
Charles W. Chuck Bryant. You can send us an email
the Stuff podcast at how Stuff works dot com. And
as always, I started this one early which goes to
show again, worst episode over, It's time for listener mail.
That's right, I'm gonna call this. Uh well, it's just
(40:31):
a nice email. Hey, guys, been a fan since two
thousand and ten, when I was a freshman in college.
I don't think I've ever written in though uh this
entire time, have been an evangelist, but to no avail.
That all change A few months ago I convinced the
love of my life, Meredith, to give you guys a shot,
And now she is fun too. She's an outstanding woman
and mother and has courageously struck out a loan for
(40:52):
a job offer she couldn't refuse. So now we live
four hundred miles apart, and having your podcast to talk
about keeps a conversation alive on day some weird feeling
a bit down? Uh, I know, it's nice. In addition,
I will also listen to you guys in the long
car rides to visit her. There's a way to distract
myself from my own excitement about getting to see her again,
and it helps the time pass faster. Uh. I know
(41:14):
it's not the first time someone's written to tell you
the same thing, and I promise I would never be
that listener. But I get it now, and when you
find it true love, you just cannot help yourself. Sometimes
this does get the coveted shout out. Tell Meredith to
keep up the good work and Happy Mother's Day. Keep
up the good work, guys. You were the first podcast
I ever listened to and still my favorite. Sleep well
(41:35):
tonight knowing that you are fostering love and real human
connections out here in podcast land. That was a great email.
That was nice. That is from Sam Martin and oh maha,
he's a medical student and a bar trivia master. Thanks
to us, he said, nice. Well, thanks a lot, Sam, Yes, Sam,
and Mereth, thanks a lot Meredith for giving us a shot.
(41:56):
We're glad it paid off. It reminds me of me
and youm do long distance for a while. It can
really really suck. Remember that you guys got through that
like a champ, though we did like two chaps. Yeah,
we've petted each other on the backs. If you want
to get in touch with us, you already know how
because I said it prematurely. Uh. And in the meantime
(42:17):
you can hang out with us. Uh. It's stuff you
should know. Dot com for more on this and thousands
of other topics. Is it how stuff works? Dot com
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