Posts by

Kelly Kizer Whitt

Awaiting the next historic solar storm

Researchers uncovering eyewitness accounts of powerful solar storms of the past say we should expect at least one super-storm from the sun per century.

Kelly Kizer Whitt

March 31, 2021

Golden hour at an Indiana lake

The golden hour - actually, more like 30 minutes - is that magical period of daylight shortly after sunrise or before sunset, when the brightness of the sky matches streetlights, signs and car headlights. Photographers love it!

Kelly Kizer Whitt

March 27, 2021

Space debris lights up the sky over Pacific Northwest

A SpaceX rocket launched on March 4 that failed to perform a deorbit burn reentered Earth's atmosphere on March 25, 2021. It created a startling light display over Seattle and Portland.

Kelly Kizer Whitt

March 26, 2021

Spring Milky Way over Cape Cod

Dark skies let the Milky Way shine, and this stunning shot from Cape Cod exhibits our galaxy in its full glory, even reflected on the water!

Kelly Kizer Whitt

March 26, 2021

Some tornadoes are more destructive than we thought

A new study documents the distribution of supercell-tornado wind intensities and sizes, revealing that most are much stronger than damage surveys indicate, with more than 20% of tornadoes potentially capable of causing catastrophic EF-4/EF-5 damage.

Kelly Kizer Whitt

March 25, 2021

Owl keeps an eye out, in New York

This nocturnal owl wakes briefly during the day to have a quick look around.

Kelly Kizer Whitt

March 25, 2021

Long trip to Mars may cause astronauts to misread emotions

A study here on Earth simulating the weightless conditions of space travel showed that the longer the participants were exposed to a low-gravity environment, the more they perceived facial expressions as angry.

Kelly Kizer Whitt

March 24, 2021

Scientists stunned to discover plants beneath mile-deep Greenland ice

Fossilized plants found in the rocks and soil beneath Greenland ice suggests the ice melted at some point in the last million years and may do so again.

Kelly Kizer Whitt

March 21, 2021

10 years after Japan’s big tsunami

See before and after satellite images of one coastal city from the March 11, 2011, Japanese tsunami. How it looked before, and how it looks today.

Kelly Kizer Whitt

March 21, 2021

SETI’s Nathalie Cabrol on modern-day Mars life, underground

SETI's Nathalie Cabrol believes a widespread biosphere exists on Mars that has migrated underground over the past few billion years.

Kelly Kizer Whitt

March 18, 2021

Kelly Kizer Whitt

Kelly Kizer Whitt - EarthSky’s nature and travel vlogger on YouTube - writes and edits some of the most fascinating stories at EarthSky.org. She's been writing about science, with a focus on astronomy, for decades. She began her career at Astronomy Magazine and made regular contributions to other outlets, including AstronomyToday and the Sierra Club. She has nine published books, including a children's picture book, Solar System Forecast, and a young adult dystopian novel, A Different Sky.