East Asian observations of low-latitude aurora during the Carrington magnetic storm

Abstract

A magnetic storm around 1859 September 2, caused by a so-called Carrington flare, was the most intense in the history of modern scientific observations, and hence is considered to be a benchmark event concerning space weather. The magnetic storm caused worldwide observations of auroras, even at very low latitudes, such as Hawaii, Panama, or Santiago. Available magnetic-field measurements at Bombay, India, showed two peaks: the main was the Carrington event, which occurred in day time in East Asia; a second storm after the Carrington event occurred at night in East Asia. In this paper, we present results from surveys of aurora records in East Asia, which provide new information concerning the aurora activity of this important event. We found some new East Asian records of low-latitude aurora observations caused by a storm which occurred after the Carrington event. The size of the aurora belt of the second peak of the Carrington magnetic storm was even wider than that of usual low-latitude aurora events.