Prof. Sam Lawler
LightNews LightNews
banner
sundogplanets.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy
Prof. Sam Lawler
@sundogplanets.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy
550 followers 38 following 1.8K posts
Professor of astronomy, farmer of goats. Asteroid (42910). She/her.

Living and learning on the land and under the skies of Treaty 4 (Saskatchewan, Canada)

🌉 bridged from ⁂ https://mastodon.social/@sundogplanets, follow @ap.brid.gy to interact
Posts Replies Media Videos
sundogplanets.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy
Looking less likely for auroras tonight. Which is ok I suppose... I need to sleep more tonight!
November 13, 2025 at 11:31 PM
sundogplanets.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy
@skyglowberlin I'm pretty sure that's the biggest kohlrabi I've ever seen! (We accidentally grew a few tiny ones this year, my partner doesn't even remember planting them. But they were harvested like 6 weeks ago at this point)
November 13, 2025 at 9:41 PM
sundogplanets.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy
Ooooo "octupolar perturbations to the classical von Zeipel-Lidov–Kozai dynamics" oh I love it!

(This kind of nerdy crap is what I'd rather be doing than yelling about satellites. Sigh.)
November 13, 2025 at 8:32 PM
Reposted by Prof. Sam Lawler
ai6yr.m.ai6yr.org.ap.brid.gy
@sundogplanets

🤪
Aurora that looks like an avenging angle REPENT ELON! REPENT! FOR YE HAVE LAUNCHED TOO MANY PIECES OF SPACE JUNK INTO THE LOW EARTH ORBIT! BEWARE OR <insert diety> SHALL SMITE YOU FOR DARING TO CURSE THE HEAVENS WITH YOU SATELLITES!
November 13, 2025 at 8:02 PM
sundogplanets.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy
It took me until more than halfway through day 2 of ridiculous auroras to realize why my neck is all messed up today.
November 13, 2025 at 7:58 PM
sundogplanets.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy
I just had a local radio interview about the incredible auroras we've had the last 2 nights, and the host started asking me about 3I/ATLAS! Fortunately not in a conspiracy theory kind of way, just in a "hey I've got an astronomer on, time to ask questions" and he didn't tie 3I to the auroras […]
Original post on mastodon.social
mastodon.social
November 13, 2025 at 6:20 PM
sundogplanets.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy
Sky's back to normal, guys! I'm hopeful the portal sucked up at least a few Starlinks and abandoned rocket bodies before it closed, though. I'll try again tonight!
November 13, 2025 at 1:48 PM
sundogplanets.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy
More portal pictures for good measure. Though I suppose I should be careful not to give the techbros any more ideas about awful things to put in orbit...

(Everyone knows I'm kidding, right? I'm not pulling an Avi Loeb here. Auroras are AWESOME.)
Looking up at the center of the aurora columns where they all line up with our line of sight and looks like a crazy spiral rose pattern of some kind, with red and green mixed in everywhere Same as the previous picture, but a slightly different configuration of red and green Same as the previous picture, but a slightly different configuration, and with the barn silhouetted underneath Same as the previous picture, but with the overhead auroras thinning out and starting to disappear.
November 13, 2025 at 2:53 AM
sundogplanets.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy
Well, this is embarrassing. Looks like I finally cursed at Starlink enough that I finally opened up some kind of portal in VLEO right over my barn. Sorry everybody! I promise I'll help clean up.
Bright green and red auroras mixed together, but instead of viewing the vertical columns close to the horizon, the vertical columns are directly overhead, so they appear to converge on a point directly above a silhouetted barn. It looks like something out of a horror film.
November 13, 2025 at 2:44 AM
sundogplanets.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy
This is looking SOUTH. Holy crap.
A bunch of spruce trees silhouetted in front of bright green sky.
November 13, 2025 at 1:52 AM
sundogplanets.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy
More more more!
A silhouetted bare tree, with red columns behind it, and green covering the whole rest of the sky. A bunch of aurora columns on the left, starting green at the bottom and transitioning to red at the top, with green covering the rest of the sky. There are two silhouetted spruce trees in front of the green. An arc made of vertical columns starting green at the bottom, transitioning to orange and then red then purple at the top, with green in the background of the sky. A bunch of columns in an arc, but a few of the columns start lower down in the sky, and are bright green at the bottom. All of the columns transition to orange and then red and the purple. The rest of the sky is green.
November 13, 2025 at 1:50 AM
sundogplanets.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy
yes yes Yes YEs YES YES YES!!!

PURPLE! RED! ORANGE!! GREEN!!! WOWWWW

(It was not this bright naked-eye, but these colours are all totally visible! Incredible!)
A patch of bright auroras, made up of columns that all start bright green at the bottom, transition to orange further up, then bright pink, then purple. There are silhouetted trees in front, and some satellite streaks behind. Similar to the previous picture, but with some more bright green at the very bottom of the sky A patch of bright red and purple on one side of the sky, with bright green on the other, looking a bit swirly. There's silhouetted trees in front of the red, and a silhouetted barn in front of the green. An arc made up of vertical columns of purple, red, and green, with bright green background. There are silhouetted bare trees in one corner of the photo.
November 13, 2025 at 1:39 AM
sundogplanets.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy
Hard to tell through a window, but I think the sky looks kinda red again! Time to set up my camera, put on lots of layers, and head outside. Wooo!!!
November 13, 2025 at 12:37 AM
sundogplanets.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy
The sky isn't quite dark enough to see if there are auroras yet, but the fucking Starlinks are easy to see. Due to the Starlink main orbital shell configuration, there is almost always a Starlink or two visible crawling across the sky at the same elevation as the North Star (lots more in other […]
Original post on mastodon.social
mastodon.social
November 13, 2025 at 12:19 AM
sundogplanets.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy
I can't stop thinking about the auroras. That was amazing. And there very likely will be more tonight!! https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/news/g3-strong-geomagnetic-storming-continues-g4-severe-still-expected

...I wonder how it's going up there for Starlink (and the […]

[Original post on mastodon.social]
Bright red aurora with pillars mixed in, and some green around the edges. There's the silhouette of an old barn in the bottom of the photo, including an old weather vane.
November 12, 2025 at 3:49 PM
sundogplanets.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy
@ai6yr WOW you could see it there?!! Amazing!
November 12, 2025 at 3:36 PM