SPOKANE, Wash. — People all over Washington and Idaho had the opportunity to catch a brilliant light show after a powerful solar flare made the northern lights visible on Thursday night.
KREM 2 viewers sent photos from Spokane, Colville, Clarkston, Moses Lake, Coeur d'Alene, Post Falls and many other places across Eastern Washington and North Idaho showing the dazzling aurora borealis that painted the sky for several hours.
Usually, aurora are visible at G3 conditions, with Thursday night's forecasted G4 being even stronger.
Northern lights across Washington and North Idaho
The Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC) placed October 10 under a "G4 (Severe) Storm Watch," saying "A fast coronal mass ejection (CME) erupted from the Sun the evening of 8 October 2024, and is likely to arrive at Earth on 10 October."
In terms of the KP-Index, which also measures the solar storm strength, the G4 classification is equivalent to a KP-7 rating.
If you remember seeing the aurora in May, which was directly overhead and some of the brightest northern lights the Inland Northwest has seen in decades, that storm hit the maximum KP-Index of a 9!