Sudden drop in 40m signals after 8 am: Is a Geomagnetic Storm around?

I was hearing a lot of activity on 40m band with several nets and other ragchew going on. Suddenly the signals started dropping with the waterfall becoming almost ‘clean’. Checked the planetary K index. It was very much in the ‘low greens’. Heard read about a solar flare a couple of days back on X. Wonder whether it has arrived at our ionosphere?