Aurora Borealis Alerts Via Twitter
By JIM THOMAS -- Soft Serve News
WHEN ARE ALERTS SENT OUT?
Tweets (messages) will start going out once the Space Environment Center Neural Net predicts a Geomagnetic Activity level (Kp number) of 3.9 or higher signifying the Aurora is reasonably active.
Once the first tweet goes out for an auroral event, tweets will go out periodically until the storm dies down (Kp number goes below 2.5). But if the Aurora's intensity goes up or down more than 1.3 Kp from the last tweet, a new message will immediately go out. This way you'll know if storm is getting stronger or dying out.
There will be a final tweet once the Kp falls below 2.5 to basically signal the party is over.
No more tweets will occur until the next time the Kp prediction spikes above the 3.9 level.
HOW DO YOU SIGN UP?
Here's how to sign up:
1. Go to Twitter and sign up for a free account.
2. Then you'll need to have twitter “follow” the user called “Aurora_Alerts” -- to do this, navigate to http://twitter.com/Aurora_Alerts
3. Under the little Aurora picture you'll see a “Follow” button. Click on it to become a follower of Aurora_Alerts.
4. Now you'll get Aurora Alerts on your twitter page. But if you want to get texted to your cell phone, you'll need to do some more work . . .
5. Right next to the follow button you'll see a little mobile phone icon. Click on it and follow the instructions.
Also, you should limit when you get your alerts. (You don't want to get alerts at noon or at 6:00 AM when you can't, or don't want to, see the Aurora). Just go to "Settings" to make those adjustments.
Again, here's the Twitter link for Aurora Borealis activity.
Of course if you have access to the web you can get the most current, real-time info at Aurora Borealis Forecast.
IS THIS FREE?
Well, Twitter is free (at the time of this writing) and we're not charging anything, however you should know what you are being charged to receive text messages. You can always pause or end your receipt of this service via your Twitter account.