On 1 September 1859, Richard Carrington had just completed his morning observation of the sun when he saw a pair of bright crescent shapes forming near a large group of sunspots. For years, Carrington had been observing the sun by projecting its image onto a screen and meticulously sketching what he saw. He had never seen anything like this before. Excitedly, he dashed through his observatory trying to find someone to witness his discovery. But the building was deserted, and when he hurried back to his telescope he was horrified to find that the vision was already fading.
Carrington had seen a solar flare, making him the first person as far as we know to witness such an event. But his flare was not only the first on record, it was also spectacularly large. Today, new evidence suggests that Carrington had witnessed the onset of what would prove to be ...
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