This spectacular display of the Northern Lights was captured Thursday Nov. 21, 2003, over the West Sands at St Andrews in Scotland by Thomas Robitaille, an undergraduate student of Astrophysics at the town's University. The display follows a large solar flare which sends a stream of charged particles towards the earth that are captured by the magnetic field lines in the polar regions and when they hit the upper atmosphere, excite molecules of gas, mainly nitrogen and oxygen, causing them to emit an eerie green and red light.
(AP Photo/Thomas Robitaille/PA)