Aurora photos: Stunning northern lights glisten after biggest geomagnetic storm in 21 years

Spectacular images have captured the moment stunning aurora displays lit up the night sky during the strongest geomagnetic storm in 21 years, which hit Earth over the weekend. The phenomenon occurred after several large solar storms crashed into our planet's atmosphere, producing green and blue hues in skies across the Northern Hemisphere as far south as Florida. 

The last time auroras were seen this far south was October 2003, when an extreme G5 storm — the highest category for geomagnetic storms — smashed into Earth. 

Live Science editors were able to capture the event. Hannah Osborne, planet Earth and animals editor, was on the Viking Cruise ship Octantis on Lake Erie reporting on the work on-board scientists are doing to assess the health of the Great Lakes, when the solar storm hit. 

Related: 'Extreme' geomagnetic storm that painted Earth with auroras this weekend was the most powerful in 20 years

"It was an incredible experience," she said. "Staff on board were buzzing, saying they'd never seen anything like it before. They turned off all the lights and the whole sky just lit up and turned pink and green. There were streaks everywhere you looked."

On the other side of the planet, editor-in-chief Alexander McNamara saw the celestial light show from southwest England, an area of the country unused to such a spectacle. 

This weekend's geomagnetic storm, which also temporarily reached G5 levels, began at around midday ET on Friday and persisted until the early hours of Monday (May 13).