NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WKRN) — One year ago, Tennessee was treated to a rare and spectacular light show.

On May 10, 2024, News 2 received hundreds of photos and videos of the northern lights over Middle Tennessee and Southern Kentucky.

May's occurrence wasn't the only northern lights sighting in the Volunteer State; in October, the light display was spotted again.

The northern lights are called the northern lights for a reason. It's not very common to see them this far south, so why does it seem like Tennessee is seeing them more and more lately?

According to Shawn Dahl, the service coordinator at the Space Weather Prediction Center, the increased northern lights sightings are caused by the solar cycle. He said the sun has an 11-year cycle where the sun's magnetic poles flip.

Dahl added the solar maximum is a time when there are a lot of sunspots and solar storms. These solar storms are what produce the northern lights. The charged particles from the sun collide with the Earth's atmosphere, which creates the dazzling light show.

Solar storms are possible at any time, but are most common during solar maximum, said Dahl.

"Now, anything can happen from the sun, even during the lulls of solar minimum," he told News 2. "Some of the biggest storms can still happen, but it's usually around solar maximum that we have more of a risk of encounters with such activity from the sun, and right now we are at solar maximum."

Dahl said solar storms are great for the northern lights, but they can cause some pretty serious problems. According to him, strong solar storms can cause issues with the power grid, GPS system, and the satellites orbiting the globe.

In fact, he said last May's solar storm didn't impact the power grid too badly, but it did impact all the farmers who use GPS to help plant their crops. Dahl added a stronger storm is possible and could be problematic.

"We had the G-5 in May of last year that you are talking about, but that was a G-5 that was here, a G-5 is the top of the scale, but you can have a G-5 a historical one that we are planning for that's three times stronger, that we don't know if we are ready for," said Dahl.

The Space Weather Prediction Center is constantly on the lookout for the next solar storm, and just recently, they were in communication with the White House about a solar storm's impact on GPS and satellites.

According to Dahl, if you are hoping to see the northern lights again, the next few months will be the most likely, because we could start heading toward solar minimum over the next few years.

News Source : https://www.wkrn.com/news/tennessee-news/why-are-northern-lights-appearing-in-tennessee-more-often/