Not everyone is fortunate enough to witness the wonderful spectacle that the aurora borealis produce in the northern regions of the planet. But for those lucky enough to listen a little, they might be surprised.
Usually the sight is for the eyes. though The wonderful aurora borealis Which can be admired in Scandinavia, Iceland or Finland, has a voice. This is somewhat confusing.
The aurora borealis talking to us
The aurora borealis is a weather phenomenon The one who distinguishes the lights by blocking the sky of colors at night, mainly in green. These auroras occur in specific regions, in the north, called the magnetic poles.
If you are lucky one day to be able to attend This night ballet between sky and lightYou might be surprised to know The sound that these magical colors make is in the atmosphere.
This sound was first recorded by Unto Laine, an audio engineer working At Aalto University in Finland in 2012. New evidence suggests that this sound originates in the atmosphere and occurs even when the aurora borealis are not visible.
Since then, Unto Laine has been able to capture that sound on a dark night with no dancing colors in the sky, and it’s exactly the same.
ghost sound
The sound in question is very ghostly: Makes you think of the wind or of a distant waterfall. It’s astonishing and almost imperceptible, but some aurora viewers have been able to hear it.
The researchers used these recordings for the study Where did this sound come from? : It will be present in the atmosphere at 70 or 100 metres, which is not high at all.
In 2016, Unto Laine tried to understand how sound is formed. For him, at the bottom of the atmosphere, a layer of warm air forms on top of a layer of cold air. Then the corresponding electric charges accumulate in these two layers: When the aurora borealis forms and spreads through the atmosphere, it causes an electric shock Between these two layers, which produces this inquisitive sound.
“When people hear the sound, but don’t see the aurora borealis, they think it’s just an ice crack, or an animal passing by.” Mr. Lin explains
