Torontonians may be used to bright lights, but Thursday night was brighter — and prettier — than usual.

Due to a geomagnetic storm, the northern lights were visible around Toronto and parts of southern Ontario late Thursday evening into Friday morning.

In Toronto, CBC’s Nicole Mortillaro photographed the lights dancing above The Beaches in the city’s east end Thursday night. The Balmy Beach Club is visible in the distance.

(Nicole Mortillaro/CBC)

Even above the downtown lights and the CN Tower, the red hue of the Aurora shone through.

(Nicole Mortillaro/CBC)

Further north, though not as far as one might expect, CBC Toronto’s Lane Harrison caught an even more dazzling light show in Bracebridge, Ont., Thursday.

(Lane Harrison/CBC)

The town is about 150 kilometres north of Toronto, and the rural sky made for an even more brilliant canvas.

(Lane Harrison/CBC)

The northern lights, or aurora borealis, are caused by solar particles that are flung from the sun toward the Earth by an explosion of energy on the sun’s surface called a coronal mass ejection.

This year they’ve been surprisingly active in southwestern Ontario, with solar activity also making them highly visible in parts of the region back in May.