Take a Flight Over a Massive Aurora

By jmajor - August 25, 2014 at 10:06 AM UTC | Planetary Science
Aurora-oval-from-space-artist-NASA.jpg

Post

by

Alexander Gerst

.

Or perhaps I should say "eine grosse Aurora!" ESA astronaut

Alexander Gerst

made this time-lapse of a "massive aurora" as seen from the Space Station on August 24. The entire video is beautiful, showing not just a view of the ghostly green aurora but also plenty of stars, airglow, the graceful rotation of the ISS' solar arrays, and finally the blooming light of dawn – one of sixteen the crew of the Station get to witness every day.

Then again, I'm now wondering: what

is

the mass of an aurora? Hmm...

Source: ESA on Facebook