Influence of the Vongfong 2014 Hurricane on the Ionosphere and Geomagnetic Field As Detected by Swarm Satellites: 2
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Solar-Terrestrial Physics. 2019. Vol. 5. Iss. 4. P. 74–80. DOI: 10.12737/stp-54201910. © 2019 V.A. Martines-Bedenko, V.A. Pilipenko, V.I. Zakharov, V.A. Grushin. Published by INFRA-M Academic Publishing House Original Russian version: V.A. Martines-Bedenko, V.A. Pilipenko, V.I. Zakharov, V.A. Grushin, published in Solnechno-zemnaya fizika. 2019. Vol. 5. Iss. 4. P. 90–98. DOI: 10.12737/szf-54201910. © 2019 INFRA-M Academic Publishing House (Nauchno-Izdatelskii Tsentr INFRA-M) INFLUENCE OF THE VONGFONG 2014 HURRICANE ON THE IONOSPHERE AND GEOMAGNETIC FIELD AS DETECTED BY SWARM SATELLITES: 2. GEOMAGNETIC DISTURBANCES V.A. Martines-Bedenko V.I. Zakharov Institute of Physics of the Earth, Lomonosov Moscow State University, Moscow, Russia, [email protected] Moscow, Russia, [email protected] V.A. Pilipenko A.M. Obukhov Institute of Atmospheric Physics RAS, Institute of Physics of the Earth, Moscow, Russia, [email protected] Moscow, Russia, [email protected] V.A. Grushin Institute of Space Research, Institute of Space Research, Moscow, Russia, [email protected] Moscow, Russia, [email protected] Abstract. Strong meteorological disturbances in the quasi-periodic ionospheric structure with a atmosphere, accompanied by the generation of waves characteristic scale of ~70 km induced by the interaction and turbulence, can affect ionospheric plasma and of acoustic waves excited by the typhoon with the E geomagnetic field. To search for these effects, we have layer of the ionosphere. In one of the flights over the analyzed electromagnetic measurement data from low- typhoon, a burst of high-frequency noise (~0.3 Hz) was orbit Swarm satellites during flights over the typhoon observed, which can be associated with the excitation of Vongfong 2014. We have found that there are the ionospheric Alfvén resonator by atmospheric “magnetic ripples” in the upper ionosphere that are turbulence. transverse to the main geomagnetic field fluctuations of Keywords: tropical cyclone, ionosphere, small amplitude (0.5–1.5 nT) with a predominant period geomagnetic field, acoustic waves, Swarm satellites, of about 10 s caused by small-scale field-aligned field-aligned current. currents. Presumably, these quasi-periodic fluctuations are produced by the satellite’s passage through the INTRODUCTION acoustic waves excited by hurricanes and thunderstorms only 1–4 min waves reach the upper atmosphere. In this Geophysical processes with large energy release in case, the acoustic signal asymptotically takes the form of the lithosphere (earthquakes), atmosphere (typhoons, the nonlinear N wave whose parameters weakly depend on hurricanes, storms), magnetosphere (magnetic storms, radiation conditions. The area of impact on the ionosphere substorms) occur in all geophysical shells. Severe mete- due to wavefront spreading is wider than the characteristic orological disturbances accompanied by generation of size of the typhoon. An important role in acoustic radiation acoustic gravity waves (AGW) and turbulence in the propagation may be played by atmospheric waveguides atmosphere can affect the ionosphere. Numerous through which resonant waveguide modes can propagate ground-based experiments on continuous ionospheric over considerable distances. sounding have revealed sinusoidal signals in the F layer Atmospheric processes can also affect the electro- during strong thunderstorms and hurricanes [Prasad et al., magnetic field of the ionosphere. A possible exposure 1975; Raju et al., 1981; Huang et al., 1985]. In the last dec- pathway is associated with the ionospheric dynamo in ade, the ground-based sounding instruments have been the conductive E layer — drag of charged particles by supplemented with total electron content (TEC) measure- ionospheric neutral component motions and the local ments from GPS signals [Polyakova, Perevalova, 2011; generation of electric currents [Pokhotelov et al., 1995]. Nishioka et al., 2013]. Phase measurements between The exciting current system comprises field-aligned spaced radio paths satellite–receiver have found periodic currents (along the geomagnetic field Bo), which carry acoustic oscillations with amplitudes of ~0.2 TECU (~2 % the disturbance into the upper ionosphere. The possibil- of the background TEC) [Shao, Lay, 2016]. ity of generating electric fields and field-aligned cur- Ionospheric disturbances generated by intense mete- rents in the ionosphere by AGW has been shown in a orological phenomena occurred in a narrow frequency number of theoretical studies [Surkov et al., 2004; Zet- band (3–5 mHz) corresponding to the infrasonic range, tergren, Snively, 2013, 2015]. bounded from below by the Brunt-Väisälä frequency A rise in the electromagnetic noise level and plasma (the characteristic period 5–10 min). These observations density in the ionosphere over typhoons and hurricanes demonstrated the presence of an effective acoustic has been detected by LEO satellites [Mikhailova et al., channel between the lower atmosphere and the upper 2000; Isaev et al., 2002, 2010]. Measurements on board ionosphere. As the acoustic signal propagates upward in the satellite Cosmos-1809 (at a height of ~800 km) have the vertically stratified atmosphere, its amplitude in- revealed localized disturbances of the quasi-stationary creases, but absorption increases too. The limiting electric field up to 25 mV/m and concomitant variations height the acoustic signal reaches decreases with in- in the electron density Ne up to 6 % over regions with creasing frequency. As a result, from a wide spectrum of strong atmospheric disturbances [Sorokin et al., 2005]. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license Influence of the Vongfong 2014 hurricane on the ionosphere… Due to the high sensitivity of magnetometers on satellites move at a height of ~470 km close to each board the most advanced LEO satellites, effects of the other in similar orbits, spaced by ~1.4° in longitude. The generation of magnetic disturbances driven by AGW on orbit of the B satellite is at a height of ~510 km and conductive ionospheric plasma have been detected. displaced by ~135° with respect to the A and C satellite Magnetic transverse fluctuations at middle latitudes on orbits [http://directory.eoportal.org/web/eoportal/ satel- the night side may be caused by field-aligned currents lite-missions/s/swarm]. In this paper, we have used generated by medium-scale traveling ionospheric dis- magnetic field vector measurements with a frequency of turbances (TIDs) [Park et al., 2015]. Using magnetic 50 Hz [Friis-Christensen et al., 2008]. The magnetic field data from the CHAMP satellite, Nakanishi et al. field data has been converted into the local {X, Y, Z} [2014] have found magnetic ripple at middle and low coordinate system with the Z-axis, oriented along the latitudes — low-amplitude fluctuations (from 1 to 5 nT) magnetic field B, and the X-axis, directed to Earth in the with a period of about several tens of seconds in a plane plane of the geomagnetic meridian. Also on board the perpendicular to Bo. These low-amplitude fluctuations Swarm satellites, Langmuir probes recorded the plasma differ from the magnetospheric pulsations Pc2–3 rec- density (with a sampling frequency of 2 Hz). From the orded by LEO satellites [Yagova et al., 2015] in the fact magnetic field data by means of high-pass filtering we that they can be observed at any local time (although removed the trend with a critical period of 30 s. The their amplitudes in the daytime are ~3 times higher than paper presents electron density (plasma density) varia- in the nighttime), and their occurrence and amplitudes tions along the orbit n(t)=N (t)–<N > [cm–3], where do not depend on parameters of the solar wind and ge- e e <Ne> is the mean value for the interval of interest. omagnetic activity. In addition, at low latitudes geo- In the center of the typhoon there is a cylindrical re- magnetic pulsations Pc3 are of magnetospheric origin: gion ~30 km in diameter, where the wind speed and they are generated by a fast magnetosonic wave propa- pressure are minimum [Pokrovskaya, Sharkov, 2011] — gating to Earth’s surface and are seen in the magnetic typhoon eye. Around the eye there is a quasi-cylindrical field compression component (parallel to B ) [Pili- o eye wall ~75 km in radius, in which the wind speed is penko, Heilig, 2016]. The observed magnetic fluctua- maximum (up to 100 m/s). The closer is the periphery tions might have been caused by the spatial structure of of the typhoon, the lower is the wind speed, being as field-aligned currents generated by the dynamo, excited by acoustic waves propagating from the lower atmos- low as ~15 m/s at 500–000 km from the typhoon center. phere to the ionosphere. Swarm satellites confirmed the Data on the typhoon path includes positions of the eye presence of magnetic ripple with a characteristic period of the typhoon and wind intensities throughout its life- of about several tens of seconds, which was caused by time, provided by Japan Meteorological Agency small-scale field-aligned currents, in the upper iono- [http://www.jma.go.jp/jma/jma-eng/jma-center/rsmc- sphere at middle and low latitudes [Aoyama et al., hp-pub-eg/besttrack.html]. The position of the typhoon 2017]. A statistical analysis has shown that mean ampli- center is given with a periodicity of 3 hrs; for intermedi- tudes of these magnetic fluctuations during typhoons are ate moments we use linear interpolation. higher than under quiet weather conditions. Using In addition, we have used space meteorological im- Swarm data on the magnetic field, Iyemori et al. [2015] ages, taken by camera MODIS (Aqua Moderate Resolu- have confirmed that the magnetic ripple represents the tion Imaging Spectroradiometer) in the visible range, spatial structure of small-scale field-aligned currents. from NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center [https:// The observed effects raise, however, some doubts as ladsweb.modaps.eosdis.nasa.gov]. The vertical projec- to their reliability since the satellite passage in the right tion of the Swarm orbit is superimposed on the satellite place in the favorable period (weak geomagnetic dis- images.