The Aurora from Above: Why Astronauts' Photos of the Southern Lights Matter

On June 7, 2026, NASA astronaut Jessica Meir shared a timelapse video of the Southern Lights—aurora australis—recorded from the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft during the Crew-12 mission. The footage, captured from low Earth orbit about 400 kilometers up, shows something ground-based observers will never see: a bird's-eye view of glowing curtains of light draped across the southern polar regions. Instead of watching the aurora rise from the horizon, Meir's camera looks straight down into the luminous canopy.

What Creates an Aurora—and Why the Timing Matters

Auroras happen when the sun hurls energy toward Earth. During solar events, the sun releases bursts of charged particles and radiation called coronal mass ejections (CMEs). When these particles slam into Earth's magnetosphere—the invisible shield of magnetic field surrounding our planet—some of that energy funnels toward the poles. There, high in the atmosphere, it collides with oxygen and nitrogen molecules, exciting them to glow. The result is the aurora we know as the Northern or Southern Lights.

The timelapse Meir captured is a direct product of heightened solar activity. We are currently in Solar Cycle 25, which began in December 2019. According to NASA and NOAA, this solar cycle is turning out stronger than scientists predicted when it started. Mid-2026 falls right in the window when this activity remains elevated—a window that includes powerful X-class solar flares and major CME releases. From orbit at Dragon's inclination, Meir's spacecraft passed through or near the auroral zone multiple times per orbit, giving her several chances to film during a single work shift.

Why You Rarely See the Southern Lights—and Why That Changed

The Northern Lights, visible from Alaska, Scandinavia, and Canada, dominate popular imagination and photography. The Southern Lights receive less attention because much of the southern auroral oval sits over the open ocean and Antarctica. Few people live where they can see it from the ground. Astronauts in orbit, however, see both equally—they simply look down as they pass over either pole.

Jessica Meir and the Crew Dragon Advantage

Meir is not a first-time aurora observer. She flew to the International Space Station in September 2019 and served as a flight engineer there. During her time on the ISS, she participated in the first all-female spacewalk alongside fellow astronaut Christina Koch. Her experience matters: she knows when and where to position a camera relative to the spacecraft's orientation and Earth's horizon to capture auroras at their best.

The Crew Dragon spacecraft itself is built with a specific advantage for this kind of work. Unlike earlier crewed spacecraft, Dragon has large observation windows—the designers chose this deliberately. These windows, paired with modern cameras, allow astronauts to take high-quality timelapse footage of faint light in ways that would have required special scientific equipment decades ago. Reuters reports that Dragon missions are part of NASA's Commercial Crew Program, which rotates crews to and from the International Space Station aboard the Crew Dragon vehicle.

What These Videos Actually Tell Us

For researchers who study space weather—the forecast and behavior of solar activity—Meir's footage has real value beyond its beauty. Magnetometers and satellites measure the energy in a solar storm with numbers and data streams. A well-framed timelapse, by contrast, shows researchers how wide the auroral display spreads, how bright different regions glow, and how fast the light moves across the sky. It captures the spatial geography of a geomagnetic storm in a way raw data cannot.

There is a long tradition here. The famous "Earthrise" photograph from Apollo 8 in 1968 reshaped how the world thought about the planet. Meir's timelapse fits that pattern: it takes something scientists understand through instruments and lets a broad public see it directly.

The broader context here is important. With the Commercial Crew Program launching Dragon missions roughly twice a year, and with Solar Cycle 25 activity expected to remain elevated for another two to three years, we are likely to see more aurora footage from orbit. Each new mission brings updated camera hardware and expertise passed between crews. Over time, this growing archive of orbital aurora imagery—combined with ground-based and satellite data—gives space weather researchers a richer, more complete picture of what happens when the sun's energy reaches Earth's upper atmosphere.

Whether NASA and SpaceX release additional sequences from Crew-12's mission, or whether Meir publishes more through her own channels, will depend on crew schedules and the normal pace of ISS communications. What matters is that we are entering a period when the view from above will be more frequently documented than ever before—a view few will ever have in person, but one that may soon become familiar to anyone curious enough to look.