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RNZ News
28-07-2025
- Climate
- RNZ News
How to watch Tuesday's meteor showers as weather forecast threatens to spoil show
Meteors from the Phoenicids meteor shower streak across the sky in Lincoln, Canterbury region, New Zealand on 9 December 2023. Photo: AFP / Sanka Vidangama Two meteor showers will light up the dark skies on Tuesday night, but whether the forecast will allow Kiwis to gaze upon the stars is an entirely different story. Southern delta-Aquarids and alpha-Capricornids will peak at the same time late tomorrow night until the the early hours of Wednesday morning. Stargazes should be able see 10 to 20 meteorites every hour of the Southern delta-Aquarids meteor, while it's rare to see more than five of the alpha-Capricornids in any one hour, but it can appear as bright as any star. This is expected be most visible between midnight and 1am, as the radiant (near a star called alpha Capricornii) reaches its highest point in the night sky. However, that may not matter if the weather forecast has anything to do about it. Cloud cover promises to spoil the meteor show, with much of New Zealand in for heavy rain, and strong winds. MetService has again issued heavy rain warnings for Tasman - a region still recovering from recent storms. A weather front, moving east across the country, is expected to bring up to 180mm of rain to the region. There were orange rain warnings in place for Tasman east and south of Motueka, Nelson and Marlborough west of Havelock, and north of the Wairau River, through to Tuesday evening. In the North Island there were strong wind warnings across Northland, Coromandel and Bay of Plenty expected on Tuesday. Coromandel residents might also get heavy rain, with a high chance of it reaching warning level. A heavy rain warning was already in place for Taranaki Maunga and a heavy rain watch for the central mountain ranges, while strong winds were possible to the south. If the clouds do stay away and rain allows you to adventure outside, the meteorites will be best observed with the naked eye. Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
Forbes
03-06-2025
- Climate
- Forbes
In Photos: June's ‘Great Aurora' Stuns Skywatchers Around The World
The great aurora of May 31/June 1, 2025, here looking straight up in a 360° panorama, with the ... More horizon all around and the zenith at centre. This records the entire sky during the peak of the substorm at about 1:30 am with the curtains lighting up with a range of colours blending together. A rare and powerful geomagnetic storm dazzled skywatchers across the globe last weekend, with the Northern Lights (aurora borealis) and Southern Lights (aurora australis) visible far from polar regions, with images of multi-colored curtains, coronas and rays across social media. People look at Aurora Australis, also known as the Southern Lights, as it glows on the horizon over ... More Lake Ellesmere in Lincoln on the outskirts of Christchurch on June 1, 2025. (Photo by Sanka VIDANAGAMA / AFP) (Photo by SANKA VIDANAGAMA/AFP via Getty Images) The spectacular event was triggered by a massive coronal mass ejection — a cloud of charged particles hurled into space from the sun — lit up skies in Canada, the U.S., Europe, New Zealand and beyond for over 60 hours between Saturday, May 31 to Tuesday, June 3, 2025. A man takes visuals of Aurora Australis, also known as the Southern Lights, as it glows on the ... More horizon over Lake Ellesmere in Lincoln on the outskirts of Christchurch on June 1, 2025. (Photo by Sanka VIDANAGAMA / AFP) (Photo by SANKA VIDANAGAMA/AFP via Getty Images) The spectacular event was triggered by a massive coronal mass ejection — a cloud of charged particles hurled into space from the sun — lit up skies in Canada, the U.S., Europe, New Zealand and beyond for over 60 hours between Saturday, May 31 to Tuesday, June 3, 2025. The great aurora of May 31/June 1, 2025, in a ~240° panorama from northeast at left, to ... More northwest at right, taken as a substorm was hitting, and the sky was lighting up with bright and colourful curtains. Here the curtains had moved mostly to the south, at centre here, after an initial appearance at the start of the night as a diffuse band across the north. However, moments after this as the substorm peaked, the sky filled with aurora, captured in an all-sky circular panorama. As Earth approaches the solstice on June 21, typical locations in the Northern Hemisphere where the aurora oval hangs over — such as polar latitudes near 70 degrees North — currently have no hours of darkness. That makes the U.S. currently one of the best places to see the Northern Lights. The great aurora of May 31/June 1, 2025, here with a burst of red appearing for a brief time amid ... More the curtains to the east as a substorm hit boosting the brightness and colours. On this night the Kp index peaked at Kp8, unusually high. However, to the eye the aurora still remained dimmer and colourless, except for moments like this when some reds did show up to the eye. Technical: A single 5-second exposure with the Viltrox 16mm lens at f/1.8 on the Nikon Z6III at ISO 400. A long-lasting G4 geomagnetic storm, it was one of the most vivid displays of aurora in Solar Cycle 25, which is currently in its solar maximum period. The sun has an 11-14-year cycle during which its magnetic activity waxes and wanes. It wasn't, however, as powerful as the G5 geomagnetic storm last weekend that saw aurora seen from as far south as California. A man takes visuals of Aurora Australis, also known as the Southern Lights, as it glows on the ... More horizon over Lake Ellesmere in Lincoln on the outskirts of Christchurch on June 1, 2025. (Photo by Sanka VIDANAGAMA / AFP) (Photo by SANKA VIDANAGAMA/AFP via Getty Images) The long display was initially triggered by a powerful M8.2-class solar flare on May 31, which launched a fast-moving 'halo CME' — an Earth-directed coronal mass ejection. It began interacting with Earth's magnetosphere early on June 1, triggering a G4 (Severe) geomagnetic storm, with the Kp index peaking at 8 — high enough to expand the auroral oval well into mid- and low-latitude regions. The great aurora of May 31/June 1, 2025, here with particularly colourful curtains to the east as a ... More substorm hit boosting the brightness and colours. On this night the Kp index peaked at Kp8, unusually high. However, to the eye the aurora still remained dimmer and colourless, except for moments like this when some reds did show up to the eye. This is a wide-angle lens framing from the horizon to near the zenith at top. Technical: A single 5-second exposure with the Viltrox 16mm lens at f/1.8 on the Nikon Z6III at ISO 800. In the U.S., aurora was seen as far south as southern Nebraska, Missouri, and even parts of New Mexico. States including Oregon, Wyoming, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, New Hampshire, Vermont, Maine, and Massachusetts also witnessed views of the aurora. According to auroras were captured on the Gulf Coast at latitude 30 degrees North — a very rare event that reflects the storm's exceptional intensity. This photo taken on June 1, 2025 shows the aurora seen at the outskirts of Canberra, Australia. ... More (Photo by Chu Chen/Xinhua via Getty Images) Outside North America, both aurora borealis and aurora australis were seen in abundance. Canada experienced sky-filling displays, while colorful Southern Lights were seen from southern Australia, Tasmania and New Zealand. The geomagnetic storm began to wane on June 2, but minor (G1) to strong (G3) storms persisted into June 3, keeping high-latitude skywatchers on alert. The Aurora borealis, commonly known as the northern lights, is seen at Cleveland Dam Park on June ... More 03, 2025 in North Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. (Photo by) The Northern Lights are a result of the solar wind, which consists of charged particles emitted by the sun that interact with Earth's magnetic field. While much of this solar wind is deflected by the magnetic field, some charged particles travel along the magnetic field lines toward the polar regions where they enter. These particles collide with and excite oxygen and nitrogen atoms, causing them to release energy as light. This photo taken on June 1, 2025 shows a view of aurora and a dashing meteor in Jixian County of ... More Shuangyashan City, northeast China's Heilongjiang Province. (Photo by Han Yang/Xinhua via Getty Images) Wishing you clear skies and wide eyes.
