Anyone heard of the front desk calling your cabin if northern lights visible?

[Typhoon1]

Anything is possible.

[Sea42]

We see the lights almost annually here in central Wisconsin. At one time I worked a 3rd shift job where I was outside most of the night and I saw them in the months of July, August and November. They are an amazing sight!

[Labmom3]

We were very luckily to see the Northern lights here in northern PA about 10 years ago at dusk. It doesn't have to be completely dark to see them and I think a solar flare caused the lights to be seen here. The sun is in a high solar flare cycle so perhaps you will get lucky! I hope you get to see them they are quite beautiful and unlike anything I have ever seen before.

[bob brown]

Sometimes they can be seen pretty far south ... like WA state.

 

Or even further....

Back in the 1980's I was driving overnite from Dallas to Denver. Sometime around 2:00 AM, on US 87 on the Texas-New Mexico border, I started seeing the Northern Lights. They were a vivid green and red, and lasted for almost 2 hours--into Colorado. A spectacular display that I have never seen before or since....

That was during a very intense sunspot activity period that really messed up radio and tv communications.

[Yellow Lab's Rule]

http://www.space.com/

 

This is a great website. When there is expected aura activity this websites lists potential locations around the world they would been seen. They also post pictures that people have taken. I have seen the northern lights a few times in upstate NY near the Canada border and they are beautiful.

[bepsf]

I saw the Northern Lights on my first Alaska Cruise as we were Southbound - They were out over the land on the port side.

There were just a few of us in the Crow's Nest late that night - everyone else was in bed - when a deckhand came running in to tell us that they were visibile. So we gathered up our cocktails and some blankets and went up onto the roof in the cold, all huddled together there shivvering & watching the lights.

It was a most amazing scene which I'll never forget.

[GregnChris]

So are they called the Southern Lights below the equator?

 

On a Nova (I think) that I saw several years ago, they mentioned that when there are Northern Lights, there are also identical Southern Lights. That had been postulated by someone, and the program documented the trip that proved that was correct.

 

Greg

[Sea42]

So are they called the Southern Lights below the equator?

 

On a Nova (I think) that I saw several years ago, they mentioned that when there are Northern Lights, there are also identical Southern Lights. That had been postulated by someone, and the program documented the trip that proved that was correct.

 

Greg

Yes, they are the Southern Lights or Aurora Australis. In the Northern Hemishpere they are the Aurora Borealis.

[cavecreekguy]

Yes, they are the Southern Lights or Aurora Australis. In the Northern Hemishpere they are the Aurora Borealis.

 

And if I had called them Aurora Borealis in the first place I wouldn't have confused that poor soul who thought I was talking about the nightclub. But I was too lazy to look up the spelling for Borealis.

[Zyzygy]

jtl513 posted a useful link above to the Aurora Forecast Center at University of Alaska Fairbanks. Here is a specific link: http://www.gi.alaska.edu/AuroraForecast

 

According to the aurora forecasters, we are in a cycle of increased solar flare activity.

 

Boreal intensity depends on the side of the sun on which the flare occurs (i.e., is it toward earth or away from it), the intensity of the flare, and whether there are any other bodies (moon, Mercury, Venus) deflecting the charged particles.

 

Boreal visibility depends on the solar activity level, cloud cover, and the ambient light at the point of observation. Two of the reasons why September can be a good viewing season at southerly latitudes is that there is a shorter period of daylight and less cloud cover during summertime along the Alaska coast.

 

Tourists usually wait until January or February to see the aurora in Fairbanks, because of the diminished cloud cover in the drier winter air.

[mermaid72]

We were called at midnight by the staff on a Princess cruise to Alaska----- but, it was at the Alaskan Princess Lodge in Denali, not on board ship.

Perhaps that is what was meant.

This was during the month of September and no clouds or moon.

Seeing the Northern Lights is worth being awakened in the middle of the night, life is short!

[Assateague Island Princes]

To answer the original question, yes, the front desk WILL call your cabin if you request it when and if you're lucky enough to have the northern lights make an appearance. We were on the last AK cruise of the season on the Oosterdam in 2006. We had heard on CC (on the Alaska boards) that you could make this request on the ship, so we did. They didn't bat an eye when we made the request, and reconfirmed our cabin number twice to be sure they got it right.

 

Sigh.....:(unfortunately for us, the lights were not seen on that cruise. But the good news is that yes, HAL most certainly WILL call your cabin if you make the request. Wishing you great luck in seeing the dancing lights - how amazing would that be from a cruiseship???

[Ray in NH]

Last year, we did a Princess cruise tour and it was possible to ask the front desk at the lodge to call if the northern lights were out.

 

We were so fortunate and surprised when we walked out of dinner at the Princess Lodge at Denali to see everyone standing around looking UP! Yep, the lights were out and dancing about. Unfortunately, the moon was full so some of the color was washed out - but it was unexpected and a total delight. This was the very near the end of the season, in September.

 

I've done several AK cruises and have never heard mention on any ship of the front desk making this available though.

 

This is similar to our experience. We were on a late-season cruise-tour on the old Westerdam (mid-1990's) and overnighting in Dawson Creek (on the land portion of the CT). The hotel offered wake-up calls to anyone interested -- the appearance was around 02:00 AM :eek: but worth it. We were on vacation, no work later that day. :rolleyes: We had to walk a bit away from the lighting of the hotel to enhance the colors.

Living here in New Hampshire, we have not ever seen them locally (too much light pollution).

Ray in NH

[Yellow Lab's Rule]

http://lightyears.blogs.cnn.com/2012/04/24/incredible-views-of-northern-lights/?hpt=hp_c3

 

Check out ew video of Northern Lights