ATLANTA — 10 PM UPDATE: This solar storm exceeded the original forecasts from the Space Weather Prediction Center and the northern lights have been spotted in Georgia, Alabama, and South Carolina!
If you look north in the sky and see faint hues of red, purple, pink, or green -- that is the northern lights.
RELATED: Northern lights can be seen across metro Atlanta! See all the photos from those across the state
If you snap a photo, you can share them with us by using the "Near Me" section on the 11Alive app or share them with us on social media.
We will be sharing photos from this historical solar storm on 11Alive at 11 p.m.
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The Space Weather Prediction Center has issued a G5 Geomagnetic Storm Observation, the first since 2003 during the "Great Halloween Solar Storm". There was a G4 storm to hit Earth in March, but for us, it was during daylight hours.
A series of several CMEs or Coronal Mass Ejections from the sun are already arriving to Earth's outer atmosphere. These are "explosions of plasma and magnetic fields from the sun's coron," according to SWPC.
Already Friday evening, brilliant displays of the northern lights were visible across parts of Europe. They have been seen across numerous countries, from France to Germany, Austria to the United Kingdom. They were even visible in parts of Paris and as far south as Italy.
Once the sun sets, the northern half of the U.S. could also see aurora borealis, weather-dependent.
Under a G4 "Severe" Geomagnetic Storm, there can be communications issues with certain radio frequencies, GPS interruptions and impacts to satellites and spacecraft.
The last time there was an Extreme G5 storm was more than 20 years ago in October 2003, dubbed the "Halloween Solar Storms."
The Kp index is forecast to reach 9 This can give us an idea of how far south auroras could be visible.
The northern lights could be visible to the naked eye in many northern states. The map below shows this.
Will the northern lights be visible in Georgia?
Not to the naked eye, or not at all, depending on where you and how the night evolves.
There is a chance with a Kp index of 8 that they could be visible as far south as the Georgia - Tennessee state line but on the bottom of the horizon and too faint to see by yourself. The easiest way to see them in these cases is often with long-exposure photography. Light pollution can easily ruin these chances.
However, there is a chance that the northern lights could be seen in east Tennessee, not too far from Georgia.
The University of Alaska in Fairbanks predicts a map further south for aurora visibility than NOAA's.
According to their website, auroras are glows of light "caused by collisions between electrically charged particles streaming out from the sun in the solar wind that enter Earth’s atmosphere and collide with molecules and atoms of gas."
