Will the sky be clear enough to see northern lights Friday? Here's the outlook

If the northern lights are visible again Friday night, the skies in the Hudson Valley should be clear enough that skywatchers have a chance to see them.

The northern lights, also known as the aurora borealis, is a dazzling display of red and green hues in the night sky created when a severe geomagnetic storm erupts from the sun.

One of those is currently happening, and the northern lights were seen over much of the state Thursday night. They are expected to appear again Friday, and possibly Saturday, too.

Brian Furgis, a meteorologist in the National Weather Service's Albany office, said while there might be some patchy clouds Friday night, they will be thin enough that they would not completely obscure the northern lights.

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Comet may also be visible in NY this weekend

There also might be a chance to see a rare comet passing by in the coming nights.

The comet, named C/2023 A3 Tsuchininshan-ATLAS, was jointly discovered by astronomers in China and scientists in South Africa, and at first was thought to be an asteroid.

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It's making an 80,000-year orbit around the sun, and it will make its closest pass to Earth on Saturday night, when it will be about 44 million miles from Earth.

If you can find a dark area with little or no interference from light sources, it will be visible about 10 degrees above the horizon in the southwest sky, between the constellations Sagittarius and Scorpio — the archer and the scorpion.

While the comet might be visible to the unaided eye, a good set of binoculars or a small telescope might improve your chances of seeing it.

Mike Randall covers breaking news for the Times Herald-Record and the Poughkeepsie Journal. Reach him at mrandall@th-record.com.

This article originally appeared on Times Herald-Record: Will the sky be clear enough to see northern lights Friday? Here's the outlook