WEBVTT - Carrington Event 0:00:01.320 --> 0:00:04.240 Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production 0:00:04.400 --> 0:00:10.960 of iHeartRadio. 0:00:12.000 --> 0:00:15.160 Hello, and Welcome to the podcast. I'm Tracy V. Wilson, 0:00:15.440 --> 0:00:18.520 and I'm Holly Frye. A few weeks ago, I was 0:00:18.560 --> 0:00:22.120 thinking about our Octoberfest trip that is coming up later 0:00:22.200 --> 0:00:27.080 this year, and I suddenly wondered whether we might have 0:00:27.120 --> 0:00:28.440 a chance of seeing. 0:00:28.240 --> 0:00:31.480 The Aurora while we're there, partly. 0:00:31.200 --> 0:00:33.559 Because one of the places will be staying seems like 0:00:33.600 --> 0:00:36.479 it will have maybe not as much light pollution as 0:00:36.520 --> 0:00:39.320 where I live, and also partly because I have a 0:00:39.360 --> 0:00:44.199 really hard time visualizing how far north things are on 0:00:44.280 --> 0:00:49.559 other continents unless I'm actually looking at a globe. The 0:00:49.640 --> 0:00:53.800 answer is that the aurora chances are roughly comparable to 0:00:53.920 --> 0:00:57.920 being at home in Massachusetts, which means unlikely but not impossible. 0:00:58.280 --> 0:01:00.720 The only time I have seen the aurora I was 0:01:00.760 --> 0:01:04.720 in my own yard at home, so that's in spite 0:01:04.720 --> 0:01:07.320 of having tried to see them in Iceland while we 0:01:07.400 --> 0:01:11.080 were there that didn't work out. During my quest to 0:01:11.120 --> 0:01:14.000 get an answer to that question, though, I stumbled across 0:01:14.040 --> 0:01:17.559 a reference to the Carrington event, and then a couple 0:01:17.560 --> 0:01:21.080 of weeks later the Carrington event came up again in 0:01:21.240 --> 0:01:24.120 a video game that I was playing, and I thought, 0:01:24.160 --> 0:01:28.759 should that be an episode? The Carrington Event was a 0:01:28.880 --> 0:01:32.720 massive geomagnetic storm that happened in eighteen fifty nine, and 0:01:32.760 --> 0:01:36.600 in some ways it strikes me as a story of serendipity. 0:01:37.520 --> 0:01:41.440 Most people who experienced the Carrington Event saw an aurora, 0:01:41.520 --> 0:01:44.480 including lots of people who lived in places where auroras 0:01:44.480 --> 0:01:49.000 do not normally appear. Although the words Aurora borealis and 0:01:49.080 --> 0:01:52.720 Aurora australis were not coined until the early eighteenth century, 0:01:52.760 --> 0:01:57.440 there are written descriptions of phenomena that certainly sound like Aurora's. 0:01:57.520 --> 0:02:01.280 Going back to the ancient world, the oldest might be 0:02:01.360 --> 0:02:03.840 an account of a five colored light in the sky, 0:02:04.000 --> 0:02:07.920 which was recorded in China about three thousand years ago. 0:02:08.080 --> 0:02:11.919 Assyrian astrological records dating back to the seventh century BCE 0:02:12.280 --> 0:02:17.440 describe a red glow at night. Aristotle's Meteorologica, which was 0:02:17.480 --> 0:02:21.160 written around three hundred and thirty BCE, describes the nighttime 0:02:21.200 --> 0:02:26.400 appearance of chasms and trenches in blood red, which sometimes 0:02:26.440 --> 0:02:28.720 look like flames or moving torches. 0:02:29.639 --> 0:02:33.040 All of those sound like they could definitely be describing 0:02:33.240 --> 0:02:39.560 ben aurora or something else, but possibly today we know 0:02:39.639 --> 0:02:44.040 that Auroras are caused by interactions between charged particles from 0:02:44.080 --> 0:02:46.000 the Sun and atoms in the. 0:02:45.960 --> 0:02:47.359 Earth's upper atmosphere. 0:02:47.880 --> 0:02:50.960 Auroras are most common near the poles because the Earth's 0:02:51.000 --> 0:02:54.600 magnetic field deflects those charged particles, and that field is 0:02:54.720 --> 0:02:59.880 weakest around the poles. But during this event, people saw 0:03:00.080 --> 0:03:04.000 Aurora's much closer to the equator than it usually appears, 0:03:04.160 --> 0:03:08.200 including people who were living in the tropics. Astronomers and 0:03:08.280 --> 0:03:12.120 other people who were observing the Sun also noticed sun 0:03:12.120 --> 0:03:16.239 spots leading up to this event. Like descriptions of aurora's, 0:03:16.360 --> 0:03:20.080 descriptions of sunspots go back to the ancient world. People 0:03:20.120 --> 0:03:23.600 in China and Korea are known to have observed sunspots 0:03:23.880 --> 0:03:27.959 as long ago as eight hundred BCE, but the oldest 0:03:28.000 --> 0:03:30.640 known depiction of spots on the face of the Sun 0:03:30.919 --> 0:03:34.360 meaning a sketch not just a written description, is in 0:03:34.400 --> 0:03:37.520 the Chronicle of John of Worcester, which is an English 0:03:37.560 --> 0:03:41.280 text dating back to eleven twenty eight. There is also 0:03:41.400 --> 0:03:44.000 a Chinese account of a black spot on the Sun 0:03:44.040 --> 0:03:47.360 from a few months later. It may be describing the 0:03:47.400 --> 0:03:51.200 same spot, although it doesn't have an illustration to accompany it. 0:03:52.040 --> 0:03:55.400 The first people known to observe and record sunspots through 0:03:55.440 --> 0:03:59.960 a telescope were past podcast subject Thomas Harriet and Galileo 0:04:00.120 --> 0:04:03.600 Galilee in the early seventeenth century. I just went to 0:04:03.680 --> 0:04:04.760 Galileo's tomb. 0:04:05.600 --> 0:04:05.840 Oh. 0:04:08.320 --> 0:04:13.880 By the nineteenth century, people were making systematic, methodical observations 0:04:13.920 --> 0:04:18.600 of sunspot activity. One was Samuel Heinrich Schwaba, who was 0:04:18.640 --> 0:04:23.480 a pharmacist from Germany who started recording daily sunspot observations 0:04:23.480 --> 0:04:27.159 in eighteen twenty six. In eighteen twenty nine he sold 0:04:27.200 --> 0:04:30.040 his pharmacy so he could work on astronomy full time, 0:04:30.160 --> 0:04:33.039 and by eighteen forty four he had concluded that sun 0:04:33.120 --> 0:04:37.719 spots occur in ten year cycles. That number was later 0:04:37.760 --> 0:04:41.920 adjusted to eleven years, but it's sometimes still referred to 0:04:42.080 --> 0:04:43.480 as the Shaba cycle. 0:04:44.320 --> 0:04:45.440 One of the people who. 0:04:45.400 --> 0:04:49.600 Was inspired by Shwaba's work was Richard C. Carrington, who 0:04:49.680 --> 0:04:54.039 the Carrington event is named for. In addition to observing 0:04:54.120 --> 0:04:58.400 the aurora and sunspots, nineteenth century astronomers were observing the 0:04:58.440 --> 0:05:02.440 Earth's magnetic field. The ability to do this started with 0:05:02.520 --> 0:05:06.520 the discovery of the magnetic compass, in its simplest version, 0:05:06.640 --> 0:05:10.920 a magnetized needle that orients itself in response to magnetic fields. 0:05:11.720 --> 0:05:14.840 The first magnetic compasses date back to about two thousand 0:05:14.920 --> 0:05:17.919 years ago in China, and they were used for divination. 0:05:18.800 --> 0:05:21.680 It wasn't until around the eleventh century that people started 0:05:21.760 --> 0:05:26.400 using them for navigation, with magnetized devices that always oriented 0:05:26.440 --> 0:05:31.800 themselves along a magnetic north south line. By the seventeenth century, 0:05:31.839 --> 0:05:35.120 people were theorizing that the reason compasses could do this 0:05:35.800 --> 0:05:39.200 was because the Earth had a magnetic field that magnetized 0:05:39.279 --> 0:05:42.799 needles were responding to, and by the eighteenth century people 0:05:42.800 --> 0:05:46.760 had noticed that this field seemed to fluctuate. Sometimes the 0:05:46.800 --> 0:05:49.919 compass needle would shift a tiny bit from where it 0:05:49.960 --> 0:05:52.320 normally pointed, and then it would stay that way for 0:05:52.400 --> 0:05:56.920 a while before shifting back. Or on ships traveling at sea, 0:05:57.120 --> 0:05:59.880 the compass needle didn't always seem to point in a 0:06:00.080 --> 0:06:03.640 exactly the same direction, but people did not yet know 0:06:03.880 --> 0:06:08.400 why this was. In the early nineteenth century, multiple people, 0:06:08.520 --> 0:06:12.880 including William Scoresby and Carl Friedrich Gauss, developed magnetometers to 0:06:12.920 --> 0:06:16.800 measure magnetic fields, and astronomers started using these instruments to 0:06:16.880 --> 0:06:21.400 record data about the Earth's magnetic field. In eighteen thirty six, 0:06:21.560 --> 0:06:24.839 Baron Alexander van Humboldt wrote a letter to the President 0:06:24.920 --> 0:06:27.800 of the Royal Society that called for the creation of 0:06:27.839 --> 0:06:33.000 a network of magnetic observatories all over the world. Humboldt 0:06:33.040 --> 0:06:35.400 was a foreign member of the Society, and he had 0:06:35.400 --> 0:06:39.560 already worked to get such observatories established in Russia, China, 0:06:39.720 --> 0:06:44.280 and multiple nations across continental Europe. In response to Humboldt's 0:06:44.279 --> 0:06:48.480 recommendation and the advocacy of people like astronomer John Herschel 0:06:48.600 --> 0:06:53.000 and natural philosopher William Hewell, Britain set up observatories in 0:06:53.040 --> 0:06:57.440 its territory, including in Toronto, Canada, Hobart, Australia, and on 0:06:57.520 --> 0:07:00.320 the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa. A lot 0:07:00.400 --> 0:07:04.479 of these observatories were also on their island territories, including 0:07:04.640 --> 0:07:08.560 Saint Helena in the South Atlantic Ocean, two different islands 0:07:08.600 --> 0:07:11.520 in New Zealand, and the Falkland Islands off the coast 0:07:11.560 --> 0:07:14.600 of South America, as well as the Kerglan Islands in 0:07:14.640 --> 0:07:17.800 the Southern Indian Ocean below the Antarctic Circle. 0:07:18.600 --> 0:07:22.400 Britain's efforts in establishing these observatories came to be known 0:07:22.760 --> 0:07:26.960 as the Magnetic Scheme, or sometimes the Magnetic Crusade, and 0:07:27.040 --> 0:07:32.440 this crusade combined Victorian erascientific curiosity with the practical needs 0:07:32.480 --> 0:07:37.960 of the British Navy. Magnetic compass readings were imprecise, compasses 0:07:38.040 --> 0:07:42.119 point to magnetic north, not true north, and magnetic north 0:07:42.360 --> 0:07:46.440 changes over time. There are also variations in the Earth's 0:07:46.480 --> 0:07:51.160 magnetic field that affect these compass readings. The increased use 0:07:51.160 --> 0:07:55.440 of iron in shipbuilding exacerbated these issues, and the British 0:07:55.520 --> 0:07:58.840 Navy wanted to get more information about the Earth's magnetic 0:07:58.880 --> 0:08:02.840 field to try to assault these problems. By eighteen fifty two, 0:08:03.000 --> 0:08:07.360 thanks to ongoing observations of sunspot activity and readings from 0:08:07.440 --> 0:08:11.600 all of these magnetometer stations, astronomers had also started to 0:08:11.640 --> 0:08:16.240 make connections between sunspot activity and activity in the Earth's 0:08:16.280 --> 0:08:20.120 magnetic field, with disruptions in the field seeming to follow 0:08:20.200 --> 0:08:24.000 sunspot activity. In addition to all of this, in the 0:08:24.040 --> 0:08:26.840 mid nineteenth century, there were a lot of people who 0:08:26.840 --> 0:08:31.160 were interested in astronomy and had set up their own observatories. 0:08:31.600 --> 0:08:36.400 One was Richard C. Carrington, whose private observatory was in Redhill, Surrey, 0:08:36.520 --> 0:08:40.040 south of London. Carrington was elected to the Royal Society 0:08:40.040 --> 0:08:43.199 in eighteen fifty and the Royal Astronomical Society in eighteen 0:08:43.280 --> 0:08:47.839 fifty one. Another was Richard Hodgson, whose observatory was at 0:08:47.840 --> 0:08:51.880 his home, Claybury Hall, near Woodford, Essex, northeast of London. 0:08:52.559 --> 0:08:55.960 Hodgson had become a fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society 0:08:55.960 --> 0:09:00.679 in eighteen forty eight. And one more nineteenth century redevelopment 0:09:00.760 --> 0:09:03.560 that was connected to all of this was the telegraph. 0:09:04.320 --> 0:09:07.760 The first practical telegraphs were developed in the eighteen thirties. 0:09:07.880 --> 0:09:11.320 That is also when Samuel Morse developed his system of 0:09:11.360 --> 0:09:14.880 dots and dashes that is known as Morse code. By 0:09:14.880 --> 0:09:18.640 the eighteen forties, cities were being connected with telegraph wires. 0:09:19.280 --> 0:09:23.280 In eighteen fifty nine, there wasn't yet a transcontinental telegraph 0:09:23.320 --> 0:09:27.079 line in North America, and there wasn't a transatlantic cable. 0:09:27.880 --> 0:09:30.080 One had been laid in eighteen fifty eight that had 0:09:30.160 --> 0:09:34.000 quickly stopped working, and it wasn't replaced until eighteen sixty six. 0:09:34.600 --> 0:09:38.120 We did an episode on this in twenty sixteen. But 0:09:38.240 --> 0:09:41.280 especially at North America and Europe, a lot of cities 0:09:41.280 --> 0:09:45.000 and towns were connected to one another by telegraph. This 0:09:45.160 --> 0:09:48.760 solar storm had an effect on telegraph lines and machinery, 0:09:49.080 --> 0:09:50.400 and we're going to get to all of that in 0:09:50.480 --> 0:09:53.720 a bit, but it also let people communicate about what 0:09:53.800 --> 0:09:58.319 they were seeing, experiencing, and measuring much faster than before 0:09:58.320 --> 0:10:02.720 the telegraph was developed. It is very likely that the 0:10:02.760 --> 0:10:07.160 Carrington event was not the largest geomagnetic storm ever to 0:10:07.240 --> 0:10:11.400 hit the Earth. For example, in seventeen seventy people in China, Korea, 0:10:11.440 --> 0:10:15.160 and Japan reported a bright red aurora which lasted for 0:10:15.200 --> 0:10:18.440 more than a week and was concurrent with sun spots 0:10:18.480 --> 0:10:21.120 that were about twice the size of the ones that 0:10:21.160 --> 0:10:25.160 were observed around the Carrington event. Also in twenty twelve, 0:10:25.360 --> 0:10:29.360 Japanese physicist Fusumiyaki, who was a PhD student at the time, 0:10:29.920 --> 0:10:34.560 discovered large spikes in carbon fourteen in tree rings, in 0:10:34.600 --> 0:10:38.000 this case rings dating back to the year seven seventy four. 0:10:39.200 --> 0:10:43.080 Other research has found examples of other huge carbon fourteen 0:10:43.160 --> 0:10:46.520 spikes in tree rings from other years, and we really 0:10:46.520 --> 0:10:49.679 don't know much about what caused these spikes, although they 0:10:49.720 --> 0:10:53.160 are believed to have been caused by solar energetic particle 0:10:53.200 --> 0:10:56.720 events that were probably much bigger than the Carrington event. 0:10:57.480 --> 0:10:59.760 We also don't really know what people on Earth may 0:10:59.760 --> 0:11:03.960 have been experienced while these Miaki events were happening. There 0:11:03.960 --> 0:11:07.680 are some very brief mentions of phenomenon that may have 0:11:07.880 --> 0:11:10.640 been auroras in some of the same years, but they 0:11:10.679 --> 0:11:13.000 aren't a whole lot to go on, and there wasn't 0:11:13.080 --> 0:11:15.880 a way to measure whatever it was that was happening. 0:11:16.679 --> 0:11:19.440 And that's what I find to be so serendipitous about 0:11:19.480 --> 0:11:21.800 the Carrington event, which is not something I would normally 0:11:21.840 --> 0:11:24.720 say about something that had so much to do with 0:11:25.120 --> 0:11:29.439 Britain's colonial empire project. Over just a couple of decades, 0:11:29.559 --> 0:11:33.000 magnetic observatories had been set up all over the world, 0:11:33.120 --> 0:11:37.040 including equipment on ships at sea. People had started watching 0:11:37.120 --> 0:11:39.680 the sun and recording what they saw every day for 0:11:39.840 --> 0:11:43.280 long enough to notice recurring patterns. People had figured out 0:11:43.360 --> 0:11:47.920 how to use electricity to quickly send messages across long distances. 0:11:48.559 --> 0:11:51.760 So when a geomagnetic storm started in August of eighteen 0:11:51.840 --> 0:11:56.040 fifty nine, things were already in place and recently in 0:11:56.080 --> 0:11:59.160 place for people to not only see its effects, but 0:11:59.240 --> 0:12:02.520 also measure that those effects and record them and to 0:12:02.720 --> 0:12:05.640 very quickly realize that it was happening in other places too. 0:12:06.200 --> 0:12:07.839 And we're going to talk more about all of this 0:12:07.960 --> 0:12:09.880 after we pause for a sponsor break. 0:12:19.400 --> 0:12:23.120 The Carrington event is sometimes described as two solar events 0:12:23.120 --> 0:12:26.360 that happened very close together, one on August twenty eighth 0:12:26.360 --> 0:12:29.200 and twenty ninth, eighteen fifty nine, and the other on 0:12:29.240 --> 0:12:33.600 September first and second. It's also described as one event 0:12:33.679 --> 0:12:37.600 that stretched over that whole window, but with reduced activity 0:12:37.760 --> 0:12:42.040 around August thirtieth and thirty first. People had also noticed 0:12:42.200 --> 0:12:45.760 changes in the sun in the days before any effects 0:12:45.760 --> 0:12:48.960 were noticed on Earth, with a particularly large group of 0:12:49.000 --> 0:12:51.319 sunspots noted on August twenty sixth. 0:12:52.160 --> 0:12:56.280 During the first phase of this geomagnetic storm, skies were 0:12:56.320 --> 0:13:00.640 clear over much of the northern hemisphere. Eighth was the 0:13:00.720 --> 0:13:04.760 new moon, so the skies were also particularly dark. Basically, 0:13:05.040 --> 0:13:07.840 these were great conditions for seeing an aurora. 0:13:08.520 --> 0:13:10.280 As we said at the top of the show, most 0:13:10.320 --> 0:13:14.040 people who experienced the Carrington event or knew that they 0:13:14.040 --> 0:13:17.400 were experiencing something during the event did so by seeing 0:13:17.559 --> 0:13:21.840 an aurora, and the descriptions of what people saw sound incredible. 0:13:22.080 --> 0:13:25.480 The Boston Transcript ran this description on September fifth. 0:13:25.559 --> 0:13:25.959 Quote. 0:13:26.120 --> 0:13:29.760 On Sunday evening in Vermont, the twenty eighth, at seven 0:13:29.760 --> 0:13:32.840 and a half o'clock, we were notified of a large 0:13:32.960 --> 0:13:35.480 fire behind the mountain to the north, and we went 0:13:35.520 --> 0:13:39.000 out to see it, and presently the red clouds began 0:13:39.080 --> 0:13:42.000 to disappear, and spires of green shot up from the 0:13:42.040 --> 0:13:46.439 same place. It was the most magnificent display ever witnessed 0:13:46.520 --> 0:13:49.720 in this section. The sky for about an hour more 0:13:49.880 --> 0:13:52.880 kept changing from green to red till ten and a 0:13:52.920 --> 0:13:56.520 half o'clock, when all the brilliancy was gone except a 0:13:56.520 --> 0:13:57.960 little green at the north. 0:13:58.720 --> 0:14:01.720 Here's how it was described in the Washington Daily National 0:14:01.720 --> 0:14:06.160 Intelligencer of Washington, d c. On August thirty first quote. 0:14:06.520 --> 0:14:10.720 The light appeared in streams, sometimes of a pure milky whiteness, 0:14:11.000 --> 0:14:14.640 and sometimes of a light crimson. The white and rose 0:14:14.679 --> 0:14:17.280 red waves of light as they swept to and from 0:14:17.320 --> 0:14:21.560 the corona were beautiful beyond description. And a friend nearby us, 0:14:21.640 --> 0:14:24.040 while looking to the zenith with the whole heavens and 0:14:24.080 --> 0:14:27.400 earth lighted up at a greater brilliancy than is afforded 0:14:27.400 --> 0:14:30.160 by the full moon, said that it was like resting 0:14:30.200 --> 0:14:34.400 beneath the wings of the Almighty. The crown above indeed 0:14:34.600 --> 0:14:38.480 seemed like a throne of silver, purple and crimson, hung 0:14:38.640 --> 0:14:42.040 and spread out with curtains or wings of dazzling beauty. 0:14:42.840 --> 0:14:46.280 The tremulous motion of moving light, which the inhabitants of 0:14:46.320 --> 0:14:49.920 the Shetland Islands called the merry Dancers, was less apparent 0:14:49.960 --> 0:14:53.720 than usual, but in place of it came those full, bright, 0:14:54.280 --> 0:14:57.560 changing but more steady streams of light, which gave an 0:14:57.600 --> 0:14:59.920 intense brilliancy to the whole heaven. 0:15:01.320 --> 0:15:04.280 Because of time zones and the International date line, it 0:15:04.360 --> 0:15:08.320 was August twenty ninth when the unusual aurora started in Australia. 0:15:09.000 --> 0:15:13.080 The Hobart Town Mercury reported quote, it was beyond all conception, 0:15:13.240 --> 0:15:17.400 the most magnificent aurora ever seen in the colony. Some 0:15:17.440 --> 0:15:20.520 of the descriptions of the aurora as seen in South 0:15:20.560 --> 0:15:25.160 Australia describe a meteor streaking across the sky just before 0:15:25.160 --> 0:15:29.120 the aurora started. I'm not totally sure whether this was 0:15:29.280 --> 0:15:32.960 actually a meteor that was visible from South Australia, or 0:15:33.040 --> 0:15:36.560 if that's more what people thought they were seeing before 0:15:36.600 --> 0:15:38.280 the rest of the color really started. 0:15:38.800 --> 0:15:42.200 People around the world were also talking about how bright 0:15:42.280 --> 0:15:46.840 it was. Professor Daniel Kirkwood of Bloomington, Indiana said, quote, 0:15:46.920 --> 0:15:50.640 it was the lightest moonless night our citizens have ever known. 0:15:51.760 --> 0:15:55.120 Other descriptions call the sky brighter than during the full moon, 0:15:55.360 --> 0:15:58.600 or bright enough to read by, As the Times of 0:15:58.680 --> 0:16:02.160 London reported, quote, during the first display, the whole of 0:16:02.200 --> 0:16:05.280 the northern hemisphere was as light as though the sun 0:16:05.360 --> 0:16:08.960 had set an hour before, and luminous waves rolled up 0:16:08.960 --> 0:16:12.640 in quick succession as far as the zenith, some a 0:16:12.720 --> 0:16:16.720 brilliancy sufficient to cast a perceptible shadow on the ground. 0:16:17.640 --> 0:16:22.040 Accounts of the aurora's return on September one are similarly dramatic. 0:16:22.560 --> 0:16:26.360 The Providence, Rhode Island Daily Post published this description on 0:16:26.440 --> 0:16:31.680 September third, quote, the auroral light sometimes is composed of threads, 0:16:31.760 --> 0:16:35.720 like the silken warp of a web. These sometimes become 0:16:35.800 --> 0:16:39.880 broken and fall to the earth. The September fifth edition 0:16:39.960 --> 0:16:43.480 of the San Francisco Harold red quote, the appearance now 0:16:43.640 --> 0:16:48.000 is positively awful. The red glare is over houses, streets, 0:16:48.040 --> 0:16:51.560 and fields, and the most dreadful of conflagrations could not 0:16:51.800 --> 0:16:56.200 cast a deeper hue abroad, so that makes it sound terrifying. 0:16:56.240 --> 0:16:59.520 But the words awful and dreadful were both used pretty 0:16:59.520 --> 0:17:04.359 commonly this time to mean inspiring awe. Elsewhere. On the 0:17:04.359 --> 0:17:07.080 same day, the Herald also said, quote, the whole sky 0:17:07.240 --> 0:17:10.480 appeared to undulate something like a field of grain in 0:17:10.560 --> 0:17:13.600 a high wind. The waters of the bay reflected the 0:17:13.600 --> 0:17:17.760 brilliant hues of the aurora. Nothing could exceed the grandeur 0:17:17.880 --> 0:17:21.480 and beauty of the site. The effect was almost bewildering, 0:17:21.760 --> 0:17:24.800 and was witnessed with mingled feelings of awe and delight 0:17:24.960 --> 0:17:29.679 by thousands on September first and second. The aurora was 0:17:29.760 --> 0:17:34.840 also apparently bright enough to confuse birds and people sleeping outdoors. 0:17:35.400 --> 0:17:38.840 The New Orleans Daily piciun carried an account of somebody 0:17:38.840 --> 0:17:42.359 who shot three larks at one am, and the larks 0:17:42.400 --> 0:17:44.919 were apparently out flying because they thought it was morning, 0:17:45.680 --> 0:17:49.960 and the Rocky Mountain News printed this account on September seventeenth, quote, 0:17:50.200 --> 0:17:53.120 we were high up on the Rocky Mountains, sleeping in 0:17:53.200 --> 0:17:53.880 the open air. 0:17:54.359 --> 0:17:55.560 A little after midnight. 0:17:55.640 --> 0:17:59.320 We were awakened by the auroral light, so bright that 0:17:59.359 --> 0:18:03.080 one could easy read common print. Some of the party 0:18:03.160 --> 0:18:07.280 insisted that it was daylight and began the preparation of breakfast. 0:18:07.920 --> 0:18:12.119 The light continued until morning, varying in intensity in different 0:18:12.160 --> 0:18:16.000 parts of the heavens, and slowly changing position. We can 0:18:16.080 --> 0:18:19.640 best describe it as the sky being overcast with very 0:18:19.720 --> 0:18:24.000 light cirrus clouds wafted before a gentle breeze and lighted 0:18:24.080 --> 0:18:27.600 up by an immense conflagration. It had rained for fifty 0:18:27.640 --> 0:18:32.000 hours before, only ceasing about twelve hours before the auroral light. 0:18:32.960 --> 0:18:34.159 In terms of where. 0:18:33.960 --> 0:18:37.600 People saw this aurora on August twenty eighth and twenty ninth, 0:18:37.720 --> 0:18:41.320 in the northern hemisphere, it was reported all across North 0:18:41.359 --> 0:18:45.000 America and Central America, from ships and islands in the 0:18:45.000 --> 0:18:48.760 Atlantic Ocean, and through western Europe as far south as 0:18:48.800 --> 0:18:54.000 southern Spain. The southernmost reported sightings were in Hawaii, Cuba, 0:18:54.040 --> 0:18:56.680 and Panama, and on a ship at sea that was 0:18:56.720 --> 0:19:00.000 at twenty five degrees latitude north. That is the same 0:19:00.119 --> 0:19:04.600 latitude is Key Largo, Florida. Then in the southern hemisphere 0:19:04.640 --> 0:19:09.760 it was reported across southeastern Australia and Tasmania. The geomagnetic 0:19:09.840 --> 0:19:13.200 storm was stronger on September first and second, with more 0:19:13.280 --> 0:19:15.280 reports in the same regions where it had been on 0:19:15.320 --> 0:19:19.760 the twenty ninth and thirtieth, along with new reports in Japan, China, 0:19:19.880 --> 0:19:22.200 Puerto Rico, Mexico, and Chile. 0:19:23.320 --> 0:19:28.360 These two waves of geomagnetic activity wreaked havoc on all 0:19:28.359 --> 0:19:32.840 those newly established telegraph systems. There were about two hundred 0:19:32.920 --> 0:19:36.600 thousand kilometers or one hundred and twenty five thousand miles 0:19:36.640 --> 0:19:39.520 of telegraph lines in the world at this point, and 0:19:39.640 --> 0:19:42.439 the storm had an impact on the vast majority of 0:19:42.520 --> 0:19:46.600 those lines, in some cases rendering them unusable for about 0:19:46.720 --> 0:19:50.960 eight hours. Accounts of what happened at the telegraph stations 0:19:51.000 --> 0:19:55.600 were as dramatic as the accounts of the Aurora Telegraph manager. E. W. 0:19:55.720 --> 0:20:00.560 Cuggan of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania said that quote, streams of fire 0:20:01.240 --> 0:20:05.159 came from the station's circuits. On August twenty eighth, telegraph 0:20:05.280 --> 0:20:07.960 wires in France were reported as sparking. 0:20:09.119 --> 0:20:12.879 Frederick W. Royce of Washington, d C. Described having great 0:20:12.920 --> 0:20:16.119 difficulty because of the changing currents that seemed to be 0:20:16.200 --> 0:20:19.159 running along the lines. When it seemed like there was 0:20:19.200 --> 0:20:21.960 a storm on the line to Richmond, he switched to 0:20:22.000 --> 0:20:25.920 another wire, but then that wire developed the same problem. 0:20:26.240 --> 0:20:29.200 It was also erratic. Things would be fine for five 0:20:29.280 --> 0:20:31.639 or ten minutes, but then the charge would become so 0:20:31.760 --> 0:20:35.159 weak that Royce couldn't feel it, or so strong that 0:20:35.200 --> 0:20:39.399 he couldn't lift the device's electromagnet. And then, as quoted 0:20:39.400 --> 0:20:42.399 in the New York Times quote. During the display, I 0:20:42.480 --> 0:20:45.480 was calling Richmond and had one hand on the iron plate, 0:20:46.240 --> 0:20:49.600 happening to lean towards the sounder, which is against the wall. 0:20:49.960 --> 0:20:53.119 My forehead grazed a ground wire which runs down the 0:20:53.119 --> 0:20:57.960 wall near the sounder. Immediately I received a very severe 0:20:58.000 --> 0:21:01.720 electric shock, which stunned me for an instant. An old 0:21:01.760 --> 0:21:04.480 man who was sitting facing me but a few feet distant, 0:21:04.880 --> 0:21:08.000 said that he saw a spark of fire jump from 0:21:08.040 --> 0:21:12.359 my forehead to the sounder. The Morse Line experienced the 0:21:12.440 --> 0:21:17.280 same difficulty in working. In Sydney, Australia, the telegraphs were 0:21:17.400 --> 0:21:22.200 quote seized with an unaccountable fit of restiveness. They did 0:21:22.200 --> 0:21:26.879 not altogether refuse to work, but acted irregularly, the adjustment 0:21:27.000 --> 0:21:30.320 of the instruments altering so frequently that it was almost 0:21:30.400 --> 0:21:35.880 impossible to get any continuous message through. Everywhere the instruments 0:21:35.880 --> 0:21:40.280 were jammed. This started during the daytime, and telegraph operators 0:21:40.320 --> 0:21:42.280 did not know what in the world could be causing 0:21:42.320 --> 0:21:45.800 all of these problems until night fell and the aurora 0:21:45.880 --> 0:21:50.440 was visible in the sky. Multiple telegraph workers also reported 0:21:50.480 --> 0:21:54.320 being able to send messages without the batteries attached to 0:21:54.359 --> 0:21:59.320 the lines. Samuel McGowan, the General Superintendent of Electric Telegraphs, 0:21:59.359 --> 0:22:03.320 submitted a report to Parliament that described this happening in Australia. 0:22:03.520 --> 0:22:04.040 Quote. 0:22:04.160 --> 0:22:07.000 The effect upon the wires was in many cases singular. 0:22:07.520 --> 0:22:12.040 At times, prevailing atmospheric currents would entirely dissipate the artificial 0:22:12.080 --> 0:22:16.200 current and assume complete possession of the lines, baffling all 0:22:16.200 --> 0:22:21.119 attempts at rendering the communication available again. The atmospheric currents 0:22:21.119 --> 0:22:25.760 would suddenly entirely disappear. The lines would work perfectly when 0:22:25.800 --> 0:22:28.439 in a moment the electromagnets would be quite deprived of 0:22:28.480 --> 0:22:32.080 their ordinary power, The conducting medium would be polarized in 0:22:32.200 --> 0:22:35.960 several opposite directions within as many seconds, and the whole 0:22:36.080 --> 0:22:39.800 natural condition of the instruments would be instantly reversed and 0:22:40.119 --> 0:22:44.359 as suddenly set right. On one occasion, during this interesting 0:22:44.400 --> 0:22:48.400 disturbance of the natural elements, I communicated with and received 0:22:48.440 --> 0:22:52.760 an acknowledgment from a station distant thirty two miles through 0:22:52.880 --> 0:22:57.320 atmospheric currents alone, there being at the time no battery 0:22:57.359 --> 0:23:00.800 on the line. I may add that I witness similar 0:23:00.840 --> 0:23:03.760 effects about twelve years back on a line of electric 0:23:03.800 --> 0:23:07.720 telegraph in Upper Canada, during the presence of a magnificent 0:23:07.800 --> 0:23:09.720 Aurora borealis in midwinter. 0:23:10.920 --> 0:23:14.320 The same thing happened in Washington, d C. And in Boston. 0:23:14.920 --> 0:23:18.359 An account from Boston was published in the American Journal 0:23:18.400 --> 0:23:21.639 of Science after being reported in The Boston Traveler, and 0:23:21.720 --> 0:23:26.440 it relayed the experience of operators in Boston and in Portland, Maine. 0:23:27.040 --> 0:23:30.800 The Boston operator had removed the batteries from the line 0:23:30.960 --> 0:23:34.280 as was working without them. He sent a message to 0:23:34.320 --> 0:23:37.359 Portland and said they should remove that battery from the 0:23:37.400 --> 0:23:40.760 line as well. The operator in Portland did, and then 0:23:40.800 --> 0:23:44.719 they relayed messages without any batteries more easily than they 0:23:44.760 --> 0:23:49.240 had done with the batteries on The Boston operator described 0:23:49.280 --> 0:23:52.840 them as quote working with the auroral current, and said 0:23:52.840 --> 0:23:57.840 the aurora seemed to alternately neutralize and augment their batteries, 0:23:58.200 --> 0:24:01.640 making the current sometimes two strong and sometimes too weak. 0:24:02.600 --> 0:24:05.359 So if you're wondering, like, hey, what does all of 0:24:05.359 --> 0:24:07.080 this have to do with that Carrington guy that you 0:24:07.119 --> 0:24:09.800 talked about earlier, listen, be patient. We're going to get 0:24:09.840 --> 0:24:10.040 to it. 0:24:10.280 --> 0:24:11.880 We will get to it right after we hear from 0:24:11.880 --> 0:24:13.480 these sponsors that keep the show going. 0:24:19.200 --> 0:24:22.920 The reason this geomagnetic event is called the Carrington event 0:24:23.119 --> 0:24:26.840 is because on September first, eighteen fifty nine, English astronomer 0:24:26.920 --> 0:24:31.680 Richard C. Carrington was working in his private observatory in Redhill, Surrey, 0:24:32.119 --> 0:24:35.800 and he witnessed something unusual. He published an account of 0:24:35.840 --> 0:24:38.680 what he saw in the Monthly Notices of the Royal 0:24:38.760 --> 0:24:42.639 Astronomical Society in November of eighteen fifty nine, and it 0:24:42.720 --> 0:24:47.360 read quote, while engaged in the forenoon of Thursday, September first, 0:24:47.800 --> 0:24:51.520 in taking my customary observation of the forums and positions 0:24:51.560 --> 0:24:54.879 of the solar spots, an appearance was witnessed which I 0:24:54.920 --> 0:24:58.639 believe to be exceedingly rare. The image of the Sun's 0:24:58.720 --> 0:25:02.320 disc was, as usual with me, projected onto a plate 0:25:02.400 --> 0:25:06.480 of glass coated with distemper of a pale straw color, 0:25:07.040 --> 0:25:09.879 and at a distance and under a power, which presented 0:25:10.000 --> 0:25:14.240 a picture of about eleven inches diameter. I had secured 0:25:14.359 --> 0:25:18.080 diagrams of all the groups and detached spots, and was 0:25:18.200 --> 0:25:21.600