An Analysis of Trouvelot's Auroral Drawing on 1/2 March 1872: Plausible Evidence for Recurrent Geomagnetic Storms

Abstract

This work examines Trouvelot's observations and drawing of an auroral display during the night of 1 March 1872. It is known that the auroral oval moves equatorward to midlatitude and even low latitude during large geomagnetic storms. Trouvelot's graphical record of the great aurora on 1 March 1872 has been often cited as a remarkable example of a midlatitude aurora, although it is puzzling that this apparently occurred on a geomagnetically quiet day. Kataoka et al. (2019, JSWSC, 9, A16) even criticised this as a dating error. Here, we investigate Trouvelot's descriptions and available geomagnetic measurements in detail. Our analysis shows that the original date of Trouvelot's auroral drawing is most probably accurate in local time. Moreover, Trouvelot's descriptions and the observational site show that the auroral visibility fell at the beginning of 2 March 1872 in Greenwich Mean Time (GMT). Consulting simultaneous variations of magnetograms at Helsinki and Greenwich, we found that the nightside aurora specifically coincides with the initial phase of the storm (substorm) and suggests a close association with a substorm triggered by sudden magnetospheric compression. This case study shows that short geomagnetic storms can be overlooked in a daily aa index and they can also cause midlatitude aurorae. Moreover, we found ≈27-day intervals between this storm, the extreme storms on 4-6 February 1872, and another "bright aurora" that was reported on 6 January 1872. Based on their intervals, these midlatitude aurorae have probably resulted from recurrent solar activity.

Candidate Auroral Observations Indicating a Major Solar–Terrestrial Storm in 1680: Implication for Space Weather Events during the Maunder Minimum

“…The reddish glow agrees with the O I emissions in 630.0 nm or SAR arcs typical with mid-latitude aurorae (Tinsley et al, 1984;Kozyra et al, 1997). The whitish glows are typically greenish emissions (557.7 nm) without enough brightness and typically seen in the ray structure (Ebihara et al, 2017;Stephenson et al, 2019;Bhaskar et al, 2020). The yellowish (golden) colour could be their mixture.…”

Recreating the Horizontal Magnetic Field at Colaba During the Carrington Event With Geospace Simulations

“…Dst is also an often used metric in statistical studies to estimate the intensity of extreme but infrequent geomagnetic events (Chapman et al., 2020; Morina et al., 2019; Riley, 2012). Recently, multiple large pre‐1957 storms have been studied and had quasi‐Dst values calculated (Bhaskar et al., 2020; Hayakawa et al., 2020; Love et al., 2019a, 2019b). Finally, as outlined in Section 1, the Dst of the Carrington event itself has been subject to much inquiry.…”

“…and had quasi-Dst values calculated [Love et al, 2019, b;Bhaskar et al, 2020;Hayakawa et al, 2020]. Finally, as outlined in Section 1, the Dst of the Carrington event itself has been subject to much inquiry.…”

A review for Japanese auroral records on the three extreme space weather events around the International Geophysical Year (1957–1958)

“…The yellowish colourations between the lower hem and the higher, red-dominated regions are explained in terms of mixture of greenish and reddish colourations (Chamberlain, 1961), or atmospheric extinction of greenish colouration (Kataoka et al, 2019a). The whitish colouration is typically interpreted as the greenish emissions that are not bright enough for the human eye and with possible contributions from other emissions (Ebihara et al, 2017;Stephenson et al, 2019;Bhaskar et al, 2020). If the pinkish colouration was horizontally Japanese auroral records in the IGY (1957 -1958) Geoscience Data Journal, DOI: 10.1002/GDJ3.140 narrow, and rapidly moving in the horizontal direction, it would be attributed to a ray.…”