Stunning photos of Northern Lights aurora in Cornwall

Photographer Ross Jennings very nearly didn’t make it out earlier this week, after getting the aurora alert late in the day and suffering from a heavy cold.

However, despite being “freezing cold” he headed out to the North Cliffs in the Hell’s Mouth area – and it didn’t disappoint.

Beautiful pinks light up the sky (Image: Ross Jennings)

Ross, from Camborne, managed to capture arguably some of the most spectacular images of the Aurora Borealis ever taken in Cornwall.

Between midnight and the early hours of Wednesday he walked the cliffs in the area, taking photos at Hell’s Mouth and Fisherman’s Cove and capturing the beautiful pinks, yellows and oranges that lit up the night sky.

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Writing about his images, he said: “Apparently this is all due to our sun going through a more active stage in its 11-year cycle - but I think it’s probably more likely due to an imminent catastrophic pole shift.

The aurora glow from Fisherman's Cove (Image: Ross Jennings)

“These Pillars really flared up for about ten minutes, and I'm pretty sure it's the strongest I've ever seen them.”

According to the Met Office, the Northern Lights occur “as a consequence of solar activity, and result from collisions of charged particles in the solar wind colliding with molecules in the Earth's upper atmosphere.”

Pinks and yellows flare into a starlit sky on the north coast (Image: Ross Jennings)

It goes on to add: “Depending on which gas molecules are hit and where they are in the atmosphere, different amounts of energy are released as different wavelengths of light.

“Oxygen gives off green light when it is hit 60 miles above the Earth, whilst at 100-200 miles rare, all-red auroras are produced. Nitrogen causes the sky to glow blue yet when higher in the atmosphere the glow has a purple hue.”