Listening to Northern Lights

A Minnesota Planetarium Video- Natural Radio: When solar flares hit the Earth's magnetic field, the skies at both poles can light up with auroras. The particles also create very low frequency electromagnetic waves, a type of natural radio that can be picked up around the globe. Every year sound recordist Steve McGreevy heads north where the reception is best and points his receiver at the sky. Made for use in the Planetarium dome, thus the circular frame of the images)

Produced for Minnesota Planetarium and Space Discovery Center
http://mplanetarium.org/

Produced by Joel Halvorson
NASA Earth-Sun Museum Alliance (ESMA)
http://informal.jpl.nasa.gov/museum/Earth

Stephen McGreevy, Natural Radio
http://www.auroralchorus.com/

Audio gear for listening:
http://www.auroralchorus.com/wr3gx.htm

Barrett Golding, audio
http://HearingVoices.com/

Part of NPR Lost & Found Sound series
http://www.npr.org/programs/lnfsound/

Calvin Hall, photography
http://www.alaskasaurora.com/

For the International Polar Year (IPY)
http://www.ipy.org/

Category:

Travel & Events

Tags:

• aurora
• science
• NPR
• hearvox
• astronomy

[VK3CSJ]

Hi Steve...this is really quite fascinating, you have probably already mentioned it somewhere but what is the reciever you are using please for this recordings..?

thanks

Clint - Melbourne

[hearvox]

@VK3CSJ Clint: Steve uses his own receiver:

WR-3 Model VLF Whistler-Receiver

there's i link to his site in this video's info above.

[hearvox]

@VK3CSJ @VK3CSJ Clint: Steve uses his own receiver:

WR-3 Model VLF Whistler-Receiver

there's a link to his site in this video's info above.

[patachu666]

SHUT UUUUUP! i want to listen to the noises.

[VinceKato]

@MrMushroom123 Like when animals stare at nothing.

[samuraiconscious]

6:41 that's what she said.

[BornInTzyon]

That was fascinating...this is what scientists are telling the public they're hearing lately when they hear the strange, loud trumpet like noises (around the globe) but if you need special equipment to hear this kind of thing, then how is the public hearing it with their ears and and recording it with regular cams with no special equipment I wonder....

[OoLaLaFrenchGirl]

Fascinating! This is so beautiful. I had no idea that you could actually 'hear' the Northern Lights. Thank you so much for sharing this.

[WhiteWolf1088]

My mind was going ''STOP FUCKING TALKING all the time!!!'' hahaha its funny like that... with its desires, expectations.. :)

[20fireman12]

Sounds like dolphin ghostsXD

[priscillapastimes]

I heard them with my own ears when I was a kid growing up in the late 1950s or early 1960s...I was afraid to tell anyone thinking they would think I was crazy but we had strong auroras in northern Illinois that even knocked out TV reception.

[MegaBeany123]

i just hear crackling and your voice dude

[MegaBeany123]

beeee quiet you weird scientific guy pleeeaaase i wanna hear it i dont care about electro magnetic whatsitsname!!!!!!!!!!!!=p=o

[Northern206]

My dad and his friends swear that they could hear these whooshing sounds, without equipment during a week of -65 in the dead of night. He said the northern lights were so bright the whole week they reflected off the snow and made it look like dawn. They swear by it, and I believe them.

[TheThreadshitter]

OK, those whistlers are reminding me of the synths in Tom Sawyer by Rush.