Look out for amazing shining clouds in the night sky

This was a view of noctilucent clouds above Vilnius in Lithuania in 2024

If you love spectacular skies and cool clouds, then you're in for a treat!

In late spring and early summer, there is a chance for people living in the Northern Hemisphere - that's the part of the Earth that is north of the equator - to see electric blue and silver clouds shimmering in the night sky.

This amazing formation is called 'noctilucent clouds' which means 'night-shining' in Latin.

Although it's not easy to predict when noctilucent clouds will happen, weather experts say they usually appear around this time of year, about half an hour after the Sun sets.

What are noctilucent clouds and how do they form?

Noctilucent clouds form too high up to have any effect on the weather

Noctilucent clouds are collections of ice crystals that form blue or silver clouds just after sunset, and before it gets fully dark.

They take shape really high in the sky, higher than any other clouds, in an area near space called the mesophere.

It's about 50 miles (80km) above the Earth's surface and here, the Earth's atmosphere is incredibly thin, dry and cold.

The closer to the North Pole you are, the more likely you are to see them

This creates the conditions for the clouds to form - when water vapour rises from our seas and rivers, they can freeze into tiny ice crystals in this area.

When they form, the crystals trap bits of dust and smoke from burnt up meteors or other debris.

They're more common at this time of year, as the mesophere reaches its lowest temperatures around the summer solstice.