“Aurora Australis lit up the sky in brilliant shades of pink, purple and green – it was truly a beautiful sight.
“Moments like that remind you how lucky we are to have a front-row seat to such incredible natural wonders.”
Transpower, which manages New Zealand’s electric grid, earlier said the unusual space weather would interfere with the nation’s power supplies.
It issued a grid emergency notice as a precaution, with power lines in the South Island disconnected overnight to safeguard the grid against the storm.
The National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) has concluded that the last of three coronial mass injections is under way and hitting Earth, but the risk to New Zealand’s infrastructure has decreased significantly since last night.
International and domestic experts were continuing to monitor the storm.
“While this event wasn’t damaging, we are in a ‘solar maximum’ (a period of high solar activity) that started in October 2024 and increased solar activity is expected over the next few years,” NZ Civil Defence wrote on social media.
“Space weather activity can cause severe damage to New Zealand’s infrastructure, particularly the national electricity grid, with flow-on effects to power dependent services such as cell phone and internet services.”
Tom Rose is an Auckland-based journalist who covers breaking news, specialising in lifestyle, entertainment and travel. He joined the Herald in 2023.
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