Earth's Amazing Aurora, as Seen from the ISS

In this new image sent back to Earth from aboard the International Space Station (ISS), the polar lights dancing above the planet's North Pole are seen from an unusual perspective, which is from above. Most people are used to seeing auroras from below, looking like shimmering curtains of light in the dark.

But this new photograph – snapped by ISS Expedition 29 Commander Mike Fossum, a NASA astronaut – shows auroras from an angle that not many of us will get to see. The image was snapped as the ISS was moving above the Arctic.

The foreground shows two Russian-built Soyuz space capsules, which astronauts aboard the ISS can use as lifeboats in case of an emergency. Since this protocol was implemented, there have been several instances where the 6-astronaut crew had to take shelter in the spacecraft.

Auroras such as the one visible here are physical phenomena produced when solar winds hit the magnetosphere surrounding our planet. The high-energy particles begin to flow along Earth's magnetic field lines, and produce an eerie glow.