🌌 Can I See the Northern Lights in Fargo Tonight?
NOAA's aurora forecast for tonight's dark hours, plus clouds and moonlight - for Fargo-Moorhead.
The next few days
Each bar is a 3-hour block (Fargo time). Solid bars have already happened; light bars are NOAA's forecast. The dashed line is Kp 5 - roughly where it becomes visible from Fargo. Space weather forecasts change fast; for the next half hour, NOAA's 30-minute aurora forecast is the better guide.
How to see it from Fargo-Moorhead
- Look north, low on the horizon. At our latitude the aurora usually shows up as a glow or curtains toward the north, not overhead - it can be seen hundreds of miles south of where it's actually happening.[2]
- Get out of town. City lights wash it out. A dark spot with an open view north makes a big difference.[2]
- Stay up late. The best aurora is usually within an hour or two of midnight - roughly 10 p.m. to 2 a.m.[2]
- Mind the moon. A full moon makes a display look fainter.[2]
What Kp means for Fargo
Kp is NOAA's 0-9 measure of geomagnetic activity; the higher it goes, the farther south the aurora reaches.[2] At Kp 5 (a G1 storm), NOAA says the aurora "is commonly visible at high latitudes (northern Michigan and Maine)" - Fargo's latitude band (46.9° N, about the same as Caribou, Maine). At Kp 6 (G2) it "has been seen as low as New York and Idaho", and at Kp 7 (G3) as far south as Illinois and Oregon.[3] We call Kp 4 a long shot - occasionally visible from a dark spot, but don't count on it. That one's our judgment call.
References
- NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center - Planetary K-index observed and forecast; NWS Grand Forks gridded sky cover forecast for Fargo (api.weather.gov)
- NOAA SWPC - Tips on Viewing the Aurora
- NOAA SWPC - NOAA Space Weather Scales (geomagnetic storms, G1-G5)
Dark hours are astronomical twilight to astronomical twilight (the sun 18° below the horizon), calculated for Fargo. Moon brightness is calculated and checked against the U.S. Naval Observatory.