We must be mad!!

I had gone to bed at 10pm as I was feeling quite tired. I was woken up by my good lady at about quarter past midnight to say that one of our friends had just been in touch to say that there was an aurora in progress.

I dragged myself out of bed and peered out of the kitchen window but couldn't see too much due to the street lights behind the house. The lawn was looking pretty white though!!

I booted up the PC to check out my various sources of information relating to aurora and it was showing that we were on the edge of the region where it should be visible on the horizon. Another look out of the window, it was snowing again!!

The indications were that it was getting a bit stronger so we decided that we were going to venture out into the cold darkness and see what we could see from a darker vantage point. We got togged up in plenty of warm clothing, grabbed the camera bag and tripod and set off. The car thermometer was showing -2C but with the strong winds it was feeling more like -7C.

We drove to the other side of Churchill Barrier No 1 and parked up. There was a definite auroral type glow to the sky to the North East as opposed to the lights of Kirkwall reflecting off the cloud round to the North.

I set the camera up on the tripod and took a few photos. These are the results:

The lights of St Mary's Village and the Orange glow of Kirkwall mixing with the green of the aurora.

Similar view with a shorter exposure time, 20s instead of 30s

Changed lens from the 10mm wide angle to the 55mm.