Aurora Visible Over Much of Continental United States
A series of recent coronal mass ejections from the sun cased a severe geomagnetic storm on earth. On the evening of 11 November 2025 into the early morning of the 12th, this resulted in a very strong aurora borealis event visible across much of the continental United States. Reports came as far south as southern Alabama (witness this social media post from the Mobile, AL, NWS office). Much of the central and southeastern United States was cloud-free last night, opening up a rare opportunity for vast swaths of Americans to view such a unique phenomenon. The night microphysics RGB identifies where the clear areas were; the large pink regions represent the areas with clear skies as of 0300 UTC on the 12th.
The Day-Night Band on VIIRS is capable of showing what the aurora look like from the satellite view. The following image is a composite of multiple VIIRS overpasses on NOAA-21 as captured by direct broadcast antennas. Note that the peak band of light penetrated into the continental United States. The moon phase was a waning gibbous at roughly 55% illumination, providing some additional light for the clouds.
The NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center anticipates another severe geomagnetic storm from the evening of the 12th into the 13th. As such, there may be additional aurora viewing opportunities then.