April 18, 1997
On your birthday, photons that left distant stars before humans walked the Earth finally completed their journey. You began yours.
Solar Storm Causes X-Ray Aurora Credit:
Birthday · April 18, 1997
A little universe, just for you
Your date.
Ready to give.
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APOD published April 18, 1997. Full image credits are on the original APOD entry below. A publication-date match, not a photo taken on your date. Independent of NASA.
On April 7, the SOHO spacecraft spotted a Solar Storm ejecting a cloud of energetic particles toward planet Earth. The plasma cloud's center missed Earth, but high energy particles swept up by Earth's magnetosphere still created a geomagnetic storm! Residents of northerly lattitudes were treated to the spectacle of brilliant aurora as curtains of green and white light danced across the sky. In this image from April 11, the Polar Ionospheric X-ray Imaging Experiment (PIXIE) onboard NASA's orbiting POLAR spacecraft records the strongest X-ray aurora seen in more than a year of operation. The false color image overlaying a map of North America reveals X-rays generated in the upper atmosphere by showers of high energy electrons.