Aurora borealis: Stunning photos of northern lights in the Bay Area

( KRON ) — The aurora borealis lit up parts of the Northern California sky on Thursday night and KRON4 viewers were able to capture some spectacular images of nature’s lightshow.

A series of unusually strong solar storms hit the Earth Thursday, producing stunning skies that were full of pinks, purples, greens and blues. According to the National Weather Service, the phenomenon was visible from as far south as the Central Coast.

“It was a pretty extensive display yet again,” said Shawn Dahl, a space weather forecaster at the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Space Weather Prediction Center. He said the center has gotten reports of northern lights sightings even as far south as New Mexico.

“It’s been a wonderful year,” he added.

Despite NOAA issuing a severe geomagnetic storm alert earlier this week, there were no immediate reports of power or communications disruptions as a result of the storms.

Geomagnetic storms increase the chance of auroras — or the northern lights — and can potentially disrupt power and radio signals.

The northern lights occur when the sun sends more than heat and light to Earth — but also energy and charged particles known as the solar wind. But sometimes that solar wind becomes a storm.

The sun’s atmosphere occasionally “burps” out bursts of energy called coronal mass ejections. These produce solar storms, also known as geomagnetic storms, according to the NOAA.

Will aurora borealis be visible in California Friday?

According to the NOAA, Friday’s forecast shows another chance for higher-than-normal activity. However, the chances of another one of nature’s light shows are slim once you get farther south than Canada and the northern Plains states.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.

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