By Staff Writer Jerri Clewis
Auroras are a magical thing to see for many. The brilliant lights float high above the Arctic and Antarctic Circles in shades like green, pink, red, blue, and purple. People travel far and wide to see these lights, but what would happen if the lights appeared in unlikely places?
That very situation happened on September 1-2, 1859.
Auroras began happening around the world. They were seen as far south as Colombia and as far north as Australia in the Southern Hemisphere, according to NASA Spaceflight. They were seen throughout the Caribbean, Mexico, Hawaii, and even parts of China and Japan.
The auroras were so bright that people could read newspapers by the light. Gold miners in the Rocky Mountains even woke up and made breakfast in the middle of the night, tricked by the light into thinking it was early morning, according to the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration. Some were amazed, others were frightened by the unusual lights. The lights were something many had never seen or even heard of before.
It all happened because of a solar storm.
Richard Carrington observed sunspots on September 1, 1859, and witnessed a “white light flare” from a sunspot region, according to NASA Spaceflight. At the time, solar flares were unknown, and no one could have expected what had happened. A major Coronal Mass Ejection (CME) had just erupted, and it was headed straight for earth.
It took only around 17 hours to impact, much faster than normal since an earlier, smaller event around late August had cleared the path of solar wind plasma that would typically slow down a CME.
In the midst of the auroras the resulting solar storm caused, telegraphs began to face complications. The machines failed, operators were shocked, and some fires started when sparks flew from the lines. In some cases, telegraphs could send messages without batteries, seemingly powering themselves.
Solar flares and storms happen from time to time, and sometimes auroras arrive with them in unusual places, but the Carrington Event is special. It was the most intense geomagnetic storm in recorded history, and it produced one of the few observed and recorded auroral displays seen around the world.