# Usage of the term "Northern Lights" **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [July 24, 2015, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usage-of-the-term-northern-lights/726064 "2015-07-24T16:09:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2015, 2:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usage-of-the-term-northern-lights/726064/21 "2015-07-25T14:00:57Z")
> [@dtilque](#): > > I understood they had “scalar” doohickies all the way back in the 20’s… Be careful … you might be targeted. ---
**Author:** ![GrumpyBunny](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/bc8723/32.png) [@GrumpyBunny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GrumpyBunny)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2015, 2:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usage-of-the-term-northern-lights/726064/22 "2015-07-25T14:02:59Z")
> [@Senegoid](#): > > I always thought they _did_ use ill-tempered badgers in guarding borders, until I recently learned that they were all employed, in early post-WWII days, in powering message boards. Apparently it’s a recent innovation to use hamsters for that purpose. Named Wikileaks and Lemmiwinks? ---
**Author:** ![FluffyBob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ecb155/32.png) [@FluffyBob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FluffyBob)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2015, 2:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usage-of-the-term-northern-lights/726064/23 "2015-07-25T14:11:11Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > The aurora can have many different appearances. Pillars of light, too faint to show any visible color, are one of the most common. Rarer is the colored curtains effect you see so much in pictures. It might be that she mistakenly thought that only the curtains were true aurorae. > > For what it’s worth, I’ve also seen an aurora that looked like a green amoeba changing shape in the sky, one that had the whole sky changing colors with an occasional white “windshield wiper” line sweeping quickly across the sky, a few with indistinct sky glow (sometimes red and/or green, sometimes white) off to the north, and once or twice an arch of light across the sky. Sometimes it transitions from one to another: Start with pillars to the north, then the pillars split up and shift east and west, then the pillars reach high enough to combine into an arch overhead, then the arch develops more details until it looks like the curtains. I think the ‘curtain’ is the de facto form of the lights. Satellite photos show what is more or less a circle around the pole. If the curtain is directly over head you get the ‘star burst’ effect with the lights radiating from a point due to perspective, like crepuscular rays. Usually they seem to change position and colour slowly but sometimes they are really dynamic. I have seem them dance frantically a couple times and that was an amazing site. Love to watch a pulse of intense colour move silently along a curtain. Makes a person feel very small and insignificant. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2015, 2:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usage-of-the-term-northern-lights/726064/24 "2015-07-25T14:28:47Z")
Maybe you do always get the curtains, but they’re not usually detectable as such to the naked eye. Just like the colors are always there, but usually too faint to be detected. ---
**Author:** ![rjk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ed655f/32.png) [@rjk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rjk)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2015, 12:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usage-of-the-term-northern-lights/726064/25 "2015-07-26T00:25:25Z")
> [@JohnGalt](#): > > Northern lights is the local term from where I’ve lived in Minnesota and South Dakota. They were auroras only if you got yourself some education and wanted to sound all highfalutin. > > As far as seeing the auroras only once, it might be because lately they’ve been quite inactive for a long time until recently. Last month they were directly overhead and even towards the south of the zenith, so I guess they’re not legally “northern” lights - maybe that’s her distinction. Same thing in Saskatchewan; we all _knew_ “aurora” was right, but always talked about “northern lights”. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2015, 9:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usage-of-the-term-northern-lights/726064/26 "2015-07-26T09:18:23Z")
> [@Senegoid](#): > > I always thought they _did_ use ill-tempered badgers in guarding borders No, that happened. [Here’s a short (if somewhat repetitive) documentary.](http://www.badgerbadgerbadger.com/) ---
**Author:** ![Canu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/dec6dc/32.png) [@Canu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Canu)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2015, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usage-of-the-term-northern-lights/726064/27 "2015-07-27T14:53:45Z")
I think what she’s calling Northern lights is actually Zodiacal Light. I would post pictures or links, but I’m unsure of the forum rules for that. Anyway, a quick google search will pull up several pages talking about the phenomenon, as well as plenty of pictures. Zodiacal light is generally only seen in very dark skies. It’s quite different from Aurora Borealis, in that it’s sunlight reflected from “debris left over from the formation of the planets”. It is basically a single column of white light stretching up perpendicular from the horizon. I’m an amateur astronomer and have never scene it (them?), except in pictures. But I have to travel several hours to get skies dark enough to see it. ---
**Author:** ![Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a587f6/32.png) [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freddy_the_Pig)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2015, 3:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usage-of-the-term-northern-lights/726064/28 "2015-07-27T15:43:53Z")
> [@Canu](#): > > I think what she’s calling Northern lights is actually Zodiacal Light. Zodiacal Light doesn’t fit the woman’s description. Her lights were visible “only in winter”. ZL is visible year round and is most prominent in spring in the evening and autumn in the morning. ZL doesn’t form “columns in the sky” but follows the contour of the ecliptic, which is rather slanted from northern latitudes. The woman is simply wrong. If she lived in North Dakota, she would have seen the aurora more than “once in her life”. She doesn’t understand what aurora are. ---
**Author:** ![md2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@md2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md2000)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2015, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usage-of-the-term-northern-lights/726064/29 "2015-07-27T21:35:33Z")
\*There are strange things done in the midnight sun ``` By the men who moil for gold; ``` The Arctic trails have their secret tales ``` That would make your blood run cold; ``` The Northern Lights have seen queer sights, ``` But the queerest they ever did see ``` Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge ``` I cremated Sam McGee.* ``` ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2015, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usage-of-the-term-northern-lights/726064/30 "2015-07-27T21:49:54Z")
The most intense and impressive show the Northern Lights I have ever seen was on November 5, 2003, on the Kenai Peninsula in Southcentral Alaska. I remember the date, because it was the last night before I moved away from Alaska for good. Anyway, it was very impressive because it was red, a very rare occurrence. It must have been directly overhead, because the whole sky was pulsing red, on-off, on-off like a cosmic neon sign. I took it as a sign from the universe, bidding a farewell in the most Alaskan way I could ever imagine. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2015, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usage-of-the-term-northern-lights/726064/31 "2015-07-27T23:05:55Z")
What she describes as the “Northern Lights” is a reasonable description of what is, in fact, the most common form of the aurora. ---
**Author:** ![Spoons](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spoons/32/3141_2.png) [@Spoons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoons)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2015, 5:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usage-of-the-term-northern-lights/726064/32 "2015-07-28T05:39:12Z")
> [@Fear\_Itself](#): > > The most intense and impressive show the Northern Lights I have ever seen was on November 5, 2003, on the Kenai Peninsula in Southcentral Alaska. I remember the date, because it was the last night before I moved away from Alaska for good. > > Anyway, it was very impressive because it was red, a very rare occurrence. It must have been directly overhead, because the whole sky was pulsing red, on-off, on-off like a cosmic neon sign. I took it as a sign from the universe, bidding a farewell in the most Alaskan way I could ever imagine. I’ve seen the Northern Lights in red. Only once, so I won’t disagree with your assertion that such a colour is rare. Most often, when I’ve seen them, they appear green, but I do remember the red ones. Very beautiful! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usage-of-the-term-northern-lights/726064.md?page=1)