You’re not imagining it. Northern lights have been more active in WA this year. Here’s why.

Back in May 2024, the largest geomagnetic storm to hit Earth in decades caused a stunning display across Washington’s skies and even farther south. Since then, the northern lights have been back again and again.

According to Shawn Dahl, service coordinator for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Space Weather Prediction Center, it’s not a coincidence.

“What causes the northern lights, the aurora, is called geomagnetic storming, these disturbances in Earth’s magnetic field,” Dahl said in a phone call with McClatchy. “That’s usually due to activity that’s related to the sun, material moving through space, a strong, localized magnetic field that came all the way from the sun and reached Earth, and that connects with our protective magnetic barrier. That causes changes in the outer atmosphere that eventually can emit light with these particles streaming up there, and that’s what we see as the aurora.”

Geomagnetic activity approaching its peak

That geomagnetic activity runs on an 11-year cycle, which Dahl said is expected to reach its peak this year.

“It’s cyclical. So roughly every 11 years, it goes from a minimum of activity to a peak of activity, back down to a minimum,” Dahl said. “We are in (or) around solar maximum of this cycle right now. We don’t know that we’ve reached the peak yet. That’s going to be probably sometime this year or even early next year.”

According to Dahl, the increase in activity this year has caused auroras to be visible farther south than normal, into much of the U.S.

“For these manifestations of the aurora, it’s pretty routine at low levels of disturbances way up north,” Dahl said. “But we’ve had a lot of occasions, because we’re in and around solar maximum now, of the cycle. That’s been giving us G-3, G-4 levels on our one through five scale. And that makes the aurora visible across the northern tier of this country quite easily and even farther south.”

Northern lights in Washington state

The part of America where the aurora is visible includes Washington state. Auroras can be picked up in the northern part of the state, clouds permitting, at lower levels of geomagnetic activity, but they’re much easier to see at G-3 and G-4 levels.

“For the aurora to be seen in the northern tier of Washington state, it probably only takes a G-1,” Dahl said. “G-2 will get through much of the state. A G-3 will cover up the state if it’s all going on at that time of night, and even Oregon begins to have chances to see it.”

So far, Dahl said that NOAA has measured nearly ten G-4 storms, along with an increase in geomagnetic activity across all levels.

“We’re just having a general increase overall, we’re having more occurrences,” Dahl said. “We’ve had a lot of occurrences of G-3 this solar cycle. We’ve had a very good number of G-4s. I think we’re still under 10, but we’re getting close to 10 occasions where we’ve reached G-4 with a storm. We had the one where we reached G-5 levels back in early May, and that hasn’t happened since 2003.”

Aurora activity in winter 2024-25

Those numbers are only expected to go up as the solar cycle reaches its peak, and the frequent aurora sightings could continue into next year and beyond. However, the storm that occurred in May was a once-in-decades occurrence, so don’t count on that to happen again even as the solar cycle peaks.

“So all of this year, all of 2025 and even into 2026 we can expect more occasions for increased auroral appearances farther south into our country,” Dahl said of the U.S.

While much of the increased auroral activity this year has taken place in the spring and summer, the peak could coincide with the winter, which provides better conditions for viewing the northern lights in the northern hemisphere.

“(It has) nothing to do with more solar activity, more about the northern hemisphere being much longer darker periods than lighter periods almost. So you can have a wider swath to see the aurora,” Dahl said.

What you should know about northern lights

Even if you can’t see an aurora, there’s a chance that your camera can pick it up. Dahl said that the rise of cellphone cameras has made experts realize that auroras can be detected even farther south than previously thought.

“We’re learning pretty quickly that with today’s technology of digital cameras and our phones and what they can capture that our eye can’t see, that we’re seeing a lot of red aurora on these pictures that’s usually much higher up in the sky,” Dahl said. “So people are seeing the aurora from locations that we wouldn’t think would normally happen with a (given) level of storming.”

Geomagnetic activity doesn’t just affect the colors you see in the sky. It can also damage infrastructure. According to Dahl, NOAA is in contact with officials across the U.S. to make sure that the country’s infrastructure is prepared for the solar maximum.

“The solar flares, the solar radiation storms and the geomagnetic storms as a combo … affect communications, different radio bands, whether it’s satellite communications or whether it’s what we call high frequency communications,” Dahl said. “They affect GPS accuracy… rocket launches can be suspended. Astronauts on spacewalks may change their plans, and of course, the power grid can be dramatically impacted by these severe to extreme levels of geomagnetic storms.”

For up-to-date information on geomagnetic activity, you can check the Space Weather Prediction Center’s website, and for the likelihood that you’ll see an aurora, you can check their experimental aurora prediction dashboard.