Yesterday was Veterans Day, and also a major solar storm event. The earth was impacted by two CMEs, resulting in one of the largest Ground Level Event in the last 20 years. Folks flying at high altitudes were subject to 20-30 microsievert an hour of additional radiation. Auroral activity was visible (weather permitting) across the entire continental United States.
I subscribe to SMS Alerts from spaceweather.com, and received warnings of impending CMEs. My wife popped outside and saw auroral activity through our tree canopy just before 0200z (Nov 12). So we hopped in the car and drove far enough to have open skies. At about 0215z, we saw the image below through some pretty heavy cloud cover:
Auroral activity seen through clouds looking ENE.
After we returned home, the NOAA Auroral Map looked like this:
NOAA SWPC Auroral Prediction 0244Z November 12, 2025
I refer to SolarHam.com for all things related to ham radio and the sun. I was never able to capture the Kp index going to level 9, but around 0400z it was still at an 8:
The 0300z CWT was heavily impacted on 40meters, which was to be expected, as absorption must have been quite high. Even later at 1900z, the 20meter band was still upset. In fact another CME is impacting the earth now.
