Airplane Pilot Captures Ethereal Auroras from Thousands of Feet Above Ground

2026 is turning out to be the year when the Sun reaches the peak of its 25th 11-year solar cycle. Its blazing heart is flared up with chaos. Its magnetic field lines are crossing, snapping, twisting, and reorganizing, in what may seem like too much turmoil. Between January 18 and 19, this restless magnetic field became excited and launched a powerful X-class flare, launching an avalanche of billions of electrified hydrogen bombs in a coronal mass ejection (CME).

These bombs crashed on Earth’s boundary and succeeded in making their way through the magnetic bubble. Darting through Earth’s atmosphere, they collided with the tiny particles of gas scuttling around. As it happens in these kinds of collisions, the molecules became adrenalized with energy and broadcast scintillating displays of glowing colors across Europe and Canadian skies, further south than usual.

37,000 feet above northern Manitoba in Canada, airline pilot and aurora chaser Matt Melnyk (@melnyk_photos) was strapped to the cockpit of a Boeing 787 Dreamliner. As auroras materialized in the sky, he used a Canon R6 II and a Sigma 14mm F1.8 lens to record a collection of photographs. He shared some of these photos on his social media, which have since been viewed by hundreds of thousands of people across the world.

"The show started as soon as we climbed above the clouds and continued on and off during the flight from Calgary to London, U.K.," Melnyk told Space.com. "It was a historical night, that's for sure!" The Northern Lights weren’t just visible to the residents and visitors of Manitoba but all across Hudson Bay, Baffin Island, and several locations in Southern California.

The photographs he shared reveal striking curtains of glowing greens and electric purples draping the sky in layers. Voluminous columns of multiple lights rising from the horizon. Candy pinks, deep magenta, lemon yellow, sea green, faint oranges, and bluish purples; a blanket of assorted colors dressed the sky like a cosmic jewel. Up above, zillions of gem-like stars decorated the shadowy and darker patches of the sky with glitter. Some photographs show silhouettes of trees and mountains in the background, all bathed in auroral light. On the ground appear patches of snowy layers, also illuminated by the luminous lights.

The stunning display of aurora, Melnyk said, was the most incredible he has ever seen in his 20 years of flying. He said he will remember this flight for days to come. Some credit also goes to the camera lens. On most shoots, he said, he uses a 20mm F1.4 lens out of the airplane, but this time he decided to “go extra wide” for the flight, thinking that the majestic auroras required something wider. Looking at the photographs, his choice seems justified. A glow so vast and sweeping cannot really be contained in a half pint.

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