Northern lights forecast: Will Texas see the northern lights Saturday?
Will North Texas see the northern lights again this weekend? It looks pretty unlikely for a few reasons, but it is not impossible.
A massive sunspot, which is the size of 17 Earths, is continuing to fire off solar flares.
READ MORE: Why were the northern lights pink in North Texas?
NOAA's Space Weather Prediction Center says the storms have returned to "extreme" Level 5 conditions. That is the highest level on its 5-point scale.
Forecasters believe the geomagnetic storms will stick around through at least Sunday. The question is if they will reach Texas.
NOAA's current forecast does not include Texas, but it is worth noting that it was not included in Friday's forecast either.
North Texas was included in the Geophysical Institute's forecast yesterday, but the Alaska-based institute's website was down as of noon on Saturday.
Even if the auroras do make it to Texas, clouds could prevent us from seeing the phenomenon.
Cloud cover will increase throughout the day ahead of the rain we expect for most of the area on Sunday.
To boost your chance of seeing an aurora, be sure to get away from city lights.
Any that are visible will be to the north along the horizon.
Impact of Extreme Solar Storm
While that bodes well for a second round of nationwide aurora viewing Saturday night, it continues to strain electrical and satellite infrastructure. SWPC reports there have been reports of power grid irregularities and degradations to high frequency communications and GPS.
SpaceX's Starlink service warned on its website Saturday morning that it was experiencing "degraded service," though it didn't give further details. Yet SpaceX head Elon Musk had earlier posted on X that the Starlink satellites were under a lot of pressure due to the geomagnetic storm and were still holding up.
SWPC officials say those who manage vulnerable equipment have been briefed on the heightened solar activity.
"We have notified all of our infrastructure operators that we coordinate with, such as satellite operators, communication folks, and of course, the power grid here in North America (about the extreme solar event)," SWPC coordinator Shawn Dahl said Friday. "So they are able and prepared to take mitigation efforts as much as possible throughout this event if it should unfold to the levels that we currently are anticipating."
This Level 5 geomagnetic storm is the first to hit Earth since October 2003. That storm knocked out power in Sweden and damaged electrical transformers in South Africa.
In Texas, ERCOT, the operator of the state power grid, says they do not expect any grid reliability concerns during the storm. ERCOT says it will continue to monitor the conditions and, if needed, make updates to keep the public informed.
FOX Weather contributed to this report.
