Dynamics of space storm

A team from the U. of Alberta was able to observe a space storm in its full dynamics – at least during first minutes from its birth. For that, they used a network of cameras located in multiple places within Canada – you can see exact location of vertices of the grid on the video below. Phase front propagation velocity of the storm in the atmosphere was about 100000 km/h, so it took a couple of minutes for the storm to cover the whole Earth (well, half of it) from the moment first electrons hit the atmosphere.

Typically, we know that a storm hit Earth if we see auroras, and it is easier to catch them on the north, closer to magnetic poles of the Earth, where the characteristic width of the Earth’s magnetic field “layer” is much smaller than near equator. Although I spent 3 years in Helsinki, I was not lucky enough to catch an aurora