Northern lights may be visible across Wisconsin June 13 and 14. Here's when to look
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has issued a geomagnetic storm watch for June 14, and the lights may be visible throughout the state on June 13 and 14, according to the NOAA's Space Weather Prediction Center.
Both forecasts have a Kp index of four. For indexes in this range, lights will likely be "brighter and there will be more auroral activity" — if they make an appearance — since they're moving further from the poles, according to the SWPC.
The SWPC also has an aurora forecast tool, which provides a short-term forecast. The forecaster shows the lights' location and intensity for the next 30 to 90 minutes.
Rain could hinder some Wisconsinites from seeing the lights this weekend, according to forecasts from the National Weather Service.
There's a chance of showers on both June 13 and 14 in Green Bay, Appleton and Wausau. But, NWS forecasts indicate the night sky should be relatively clear for some of the state on June 14, including in Milwaukee and Madison.
The SWPC says the lights are typically best 'within an hour or two' of midnight, meaning you should keep an eye out between 10 p.m. and 2 a.m.
You should also head away from city lights and seek high vantage points for a better chance of catching a glimpse. You can find a full list of tips on the SWPC's website.
Here's a list of spots across Wisconsin that offer some of the best views of the night sky:
Newport State Park, Ellison Bay
Driftless Region, Wisconsin
Harrington Beach State Park, Belgium
Kettle Moraine State Forest, Eagle
Kohler-Andrae State Park, Sheboygan
Parnell Tower, Plymouth
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Can I see the northern lights in Wisconsin this weekend?
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Los Angeles Times
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In the 1980s, the nation averaged just 3.3 such events per year, adjusted for inflation, the database shows. The administration last week shut down the U.S. Global Change Research Program's website, which housed congressionally mandated reports and research on climate change. Meanwhile, the weather service has begun halting weather balloon operations at multiple locations due to staffing shortages, reducing the amount of data that's available. Details about the Texas incident are still unfolding. Some state officials were quick to point the finger at the National Weather Service — including Texas Division of Emergency Management Chief Nim Kidd, who said forecasts did not adequately predict the amount of rain that fell on the area. Agency officials said they did their job — issuing multiple warnings in advance of the incident, including some that advised of potentially catastrophic conditions. 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Joaquin Castro called for an investigation into whether staffing shortages at the agency played a role, telling CNN's 'State of the Union' that 'not having enough personnel is never helpful.' In a statement, the White House did not address staff reductions but said no funding cuts have yet occurred at the National Weather Service. 'The timely and accurate forecasts and alerts for Texas this weekend prove that the NWS remains fully capable of carrying out its critical mission,' a spokesperson from the U.S. Commerce Department, which oversees NOAA, said in an email. While the precise circumstances that surrounded the Texas tragedy will continue to be studied in the days and weeks ahead, experts say it is clear that such climate hazards will continue to happen. 'With a warmer atmosphere, there is no doubt that we have seen an increase in the frequency and the magnitude of flash flooding events globally,' said Jonathan Porter, chief meteorologist with AccuWeather. 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The president's proposed 2026 budget would also reduce funding for specialized, high-resolution thunderstorm models that have been developed for just this type of event, according to Swain of UC ANR. He noted that it's an area of research that was pioneered by the U.S. government, in large part because the country has some of the most extreme thunderstorm weather in the world. 'Nearly all of the research in the world, historically, toward understanding these types of storms and predicting them has been sponsored by the U.S. federal government, and nearly all the advances we have made have been U.S. taxpayer-dollar funded,' Swain said. 'Other countries aren't going to do that on behalf of the U.S. ... So if we don't do it for ourselves, we aren't going to have access to that.' The Texas flood 'is representative of precisely the kind of nightmare scenario that is going to become more likely with the further extreme cuts that are proposed, and likely to be implemented to some degree,' he added. Notably, the changes at NOAA and the NWS are meeting with other new priorities from the president, including a renewed investment in oil and gas drilling — fossil fuel industries that are among the top contributors to global warming. In southeastern states such as Florida, officials are also grappling with reduced hurricane forecasting capabilities at the height of hurricane season. And in California, where multiple wildfires are currently burning, state officials are also facing reduced firefighting capabilities as Trump deploys National Guard firefighting troops in Los Angeles and reduced forest management and firefighting staffing at the U.S. Forest Service. 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Time Magazine
12 hours ago
- Time Magazine
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Read More: Rescuers Search for Girls From Texas Camp as Flooding Death Toll Rises The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), which houses the NWS, is among the agencies that have experienced mass layoffs under the Trump Administration, with firings of probationary employees starting just weeks after Trump returned to the White May, the former directors of the NWS published an open letter to 'the American people,' warning that Trump's cuts leave 'the nation's official weather forecasting entity at a significant deficit—down more than 10% of its staffing—just as we head into the busiest time for severe storm predictions like tornadoes and hurricanes.' The authors of the letter highlighted their fears, saying: 'Our worst nightmare is that weather forecast offices will be so understaffed that there will be needless loss of life. We know that's a nightmare shared by those on the forecasting front lines—and by the people who depend on their efforts.' Rick Spinrad, the former administrator of NOAA, has addressed the current concerns, saying that while many of the weather forecast offices are not currently operating with a full staff, it's too soon to tell if that impacted how the floods were forecast and dealt with."A lot of the weather forecast offices now are not operating at full complement of staff, which means that you're really putting an extra burden on these folks. I don't know how much that was a factor in what happened in Texas this weekend," he said on Saturday. "Without research, without staff to do the work, we can assume that the predictions, and not just hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, drought, wildfires, tsunamis, for that matter, are undoubtedly going to degrade. And that means that people's ability to prepare for these storms will be compromised." The NWS San Antonio office on Monday predicted a potential for 'downpours' and heavy rain, which then escalated to a forecast of up to 7 inches of rainfall in isolated areas. On Thursday, the office issued a broad flood watch for parts of south-central Texas, including Kerr County, though the most severe warnings started when the NWS issued a 'life-threatening flash flooding' warning in Kerrville at 1:14 a.m. local time on Friday. The alert triggered the Emergency Alert System, which would have sounded the alarm on cell phones throughout the area, providing people had service and had not turned off their emergency alerts. The alert was issued roughly three hours before the first reports of flooding came in. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem joined Gov. Abbott at a press conference on Saturday afternoon, where she defended the agency against suggestions that its warnings fell short, but also said that Trump is currently overseeing an upgrade of the technology used to deliver weather alerts to the public. 'We know everybody wants more warning time and that's why we're working to update the technology that has been neglected for far too long,' she said. Meanwhile, meteorologists have said the NWS did all it could in regards to the forecasts issued prior to the floods. On Saturday, meteorologist John Morales took to social media to defend the NWS, stating that the local officials 'blaming NWS are wrong.' 'I don't see any evidence that cuts to NOAA/NWS caused any degradation in the anticipatory weather warnings ahead of this Texas tragedy,' Morales said, sharing data from the NWS. Morales later said that while nothing more could have been done prior to the flooding, he is of the opinion that unfilled positions at the NWS San Antonio station—some impacted by DOGE-driven cuts and others pre-dating Trump's second term—could have impacted the NWS' ability to effectively coordinate with local officials after the floods struck. 'The relationship between emergency managers, media, and [the] NWS is cultivated over years. It is a three-legged stool that can age well as long as it's maintained with good comms and practice,' Morales said. 'Having NWS managers—Meteorologist in Charge, Warning Coordination Meteorologist, and Science Operations Officer—missing would break the stool, but slowly.' TIME has reached out to the National Weather Service for comment. Read More: Mass Layoffs at NOAA Spark Concerns Over Weather, Climate Research Other meteorologists have also come out and said that the NWS did all it could have done prior to the floods. Meteorologist Chris Vagasky told Wired that it is incredibly difficult for a meteorologist to actually say how much rainfall will occur. 'The signal was out there that this is going to be a heavy, significant rainfall event,' Vagasky said. 'But pinpointing exactly where that's going to fall? You can't do that.' While meteorologist sensed a weather event of some sort was on the horizon, the timing of the flash flood warnings left people with little time to act. In a press conference on Sunday morning, Kerrville City manager Rice was asked about why summer camps were not evacuated, despite the warning days earlier that a storm could occur. In response, Rice said: 'That, that is a great question, but again, we want to make sure that we continue to focus. We still have 11 missing children that we want to get reunited with our families.'
