Solar Maximum: A Northern Lights Spectacular
Get ready to see even more spectacular Aurora Borealis light shows in the Northwest Territories. That’s thanks to the Solar Maximum event now affecting the Earth’s upper atmosphere.
The NWT usually experiences Aurora, also known as Northern Lights, up to 240 nights a year. The territory can now expect to witness even more frequent and intense Northern Lights due to the current Solar Maximum, which is likely to continue into 2026.
Astronomers suggest this solar maximum may be even more intense than previous events, which take place roughly every 11 years when the Sun’s magnetic pole flips.
These flips produce more solar activity, such as sunspots and solar flares, which shoot super-charged energy particles out from the Sun. These collide with oxygen and nitrogen in the Earth’s upper atmosphere and produce those distinctive and incredibly bright rainbow-coloured Northern Lights.
Green, the most common Aurora colour that can be seen from the ground, is produced when charged particles collide with oxygen molecules at altitudes of 100 to 300 kilometres. But you may also spot pink and dark red hues, produced by nitrogen molecules, or even red Aurora from oxygen molecules a bit higher up in the atmosphere (from 300 to 400 km).
Sometimes, intense activity on the Sun also produces slower-moving shock waves of magnetism, called Coronal Mass Ejections, which have been likened to atmospheric tsunamis. When these strike, they can produce more powerful Northern Lights that are even visible in the lower latitudes, as happened in May 2024.
Interestingly, a major Coronal Mass Ejection took place in 1859. Called the Carrington event, its magnetic load disabled telegraph communications in North America and Europe. Experts say the chance of this happening again is slim. However, during a Solar Maximum, powerful geomagnetic storms in the atmosphere can lead to radio blackouts, cause satellite upheavals, disrupt GPS or long-range aircraft communications, and affect power grids.
Even without a Solar Maximum event underway, on nights when the starry sky is clear, Yellowknife boasts more nights of visible Northern Lights than most northerly locations. The NWT capital is optimally located directly beneath the atmosphere’s band of maximal Auroral activity, called the Auroral oval.
AuroraMAX is primed to capture the moment
It’s no wonder the AuroraMAX observatory, a project developed to track Aurora activity, is located just outside Yellowknife. The observatory operates a digital All-Sky Imager that collects full-colour images of the night sky every six seconds, capturing a 180-degree field of view. Online since 2009, the camera’s live feed turns on automatically as soon as the sun sets in Yellowknife during the Aurora season, from August through April.
The AuroraMAX project helps scientists keep their eyes on the skies; the project is led by the University of Calgary and supported by the Canadian Space Agency, Astronomy North and the City of Yellowknife. It’s also part of Canada’s contribution to NASA’s THEMIS mission to study the Aurora and the European Space Agency’s SWARM satellite mission measuring the Earth’s magnetic field.
Traditional Knowledge
While scientific research aims to focus on the connection between Aurora and high-speed release of charged particles from the Sun, Indigenous traditional knowledge has other explanations for the Northern Lights.
In Dene culture, the origins of Northern Lights lie in a fire built by the world’s creator, as a reminder that the creator is still watching over us. Cree tradition considers Northern Lights to be the spirits of the dead who remain in the sky, trying to communicate with their loved ones below. For the Inuvialuit, Northern Lights are the shades of those once living, playing ball in the skies with a walrus skull — or a human head.
If you would like to learn more about traditional knowledge, you can have an Aurora experience with a knowledgable Indigenous tour operator.
In the Northwest Territories, two seasons for the best Aurora-viewing await you: fall (late summer) from mid-August until the end of September, and winter, from mid-November until early April. This means you won’t have any trouble getting a close-up view of the Northern Lights across the NWT.
Many lodges specialize in providing accommodations for Northern Lights experiences, and if you’re in the Western Arctic Region, you can even drive down the Invuik–Tuktoyaktuk Highway to chase the Aurora.
Licensed NWT tour operators also provide a wide variety of Aurora day trips , many of them based out of Yellowknife.
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