THE night sky across all of the UK is set to be illuminated tonight in a 'once in a lifetime' astral event.

The northern lights may be visible with the naked eye due to a severe solar storm, which is set to hit earth on Friday night into Saturday morning.

Over the past few days, the sun has launched massive clouds of charged particles toward the Earth, events known as coronal mass ejections (CMEs). When these hit Earth's magnetic field, they will ignite the aurora borealis over the Northern Hemisphere.

The CMEs are too far away from earth currently to make accurate forecasts, but many experts believe the strength of the storm will lead to a stunning display of Aurora Borealis across all of the UK, including Cornwall.

Image captured by NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) spacecraft shows the solar flare from the Sun's sunspot at bottom right of star on Thursday (9 May). SDO observes in different wavelengths to uncover different activity details. A gigantic sunspot 15 times wider than Earth could cause chaos this week. The U.S. government has released a warning to brace for severe solar storms that may knock out communications, the electric power grid, and navigation. The sunspot AR3664, stretching 124,000 miles-wide according to Spaceweather.com, has released intense bursts of energy and radiation in the direction of our planet in the form of X-class solar flares, which are the most powerful. America's official Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC) say they are monitoring the sun following the series of flares and coronal mass ejections (CMEs) that began on Wednesday. They report: "Space weather forecasters have issued a Severe (G4) Geomagnetic Storm Watch for the evening of Friday, May 10. Additional solar eruptions could cause geomagnetic storm conditions to persist through the weekend."
Image captured by NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) spacecraft shows the solar flare from the Sun's sunspot at bottom right of star on Thursday (SDO/NASA / SWNS)

The Met Office says: "Multiple Earth-directed Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs) were observed leaving the sun between 8 and 9 May.

"Due to the differing speed of the various CMEs they are expected to combine into a single larger arrival towards the end of day on Friday 10 May or early Saturday 11 May.

"Where skies are clear and provided dark enough skies, sightings are expected to develop following the CME arrival across the northern half of the UK, with a chance that aurora may become visible to all parts of the UK and similar geomagnetic latitudes.

"Enhanced activity is expected to persist, but at reduced levels through the night 11 into 12 May (Saturday into Sunday).

"Aurora activity may remain enhanced after this given the potential for further Earth directed CMEs in the coming days."

The U.S. government has however released a warning that the solar storm may knock out communications, the electric power grid and navigation.

America's official Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC) warned: "Geomagnetic storms can impact infrastructure in near-Earth orbit and on Earth’s surface, potentially disrupting communications, the electric power grid, navigation, radio and satellite operations.

"SWPC has notified the operators of these systems so they can take protective action."