Solar flares directly connected to the disruption of the Earth's magnetic field for the first time

Dr. Balfour Stewart at the Kew Observatory in London, and others, connected the erratic behavior of Earth's magnetic field directly to two solar flare events on the face of the Sun eighteen hours before. The discovery took place during one of the most spectacular magnetic storms of the century. Telegraph lines shorted out and caused fires in Europe and the United States and the display of the "Northern Lights" was unprecedented and seen as far south as Rome and Hawaii. (By John Osborne)
Source Citation
Willie Soon, Steven H. Yaskell, The Maunder Minimum and the Variable Sun-earth Connection: The Variable Sun-Earth Connection (London: World Scientific Publishing Company, 2003), 90-92.
G.S. Lakhina, et al, "Research on Historical Records of Geomagnetic Storms," Coronal and Stellar Mass Ejections: Proceedings of the 226th Symposium of the International Astronomical Union Held in Beijing, China, September 13-17, 2004 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 4-6.
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    Science/Technology
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