EMRP2.10

Geomagnetic variations are mainly produced by external currents in the ionosphere and magnetosphere, and secondarily by induced (internal/telluric) currents in the conducting Earth. Large geomagnetically induced currents (GIC) are associated with large time derivatives of the horizontal magnetic field. Recent results show that the time derivative is typically dominated by the contribution from the telluric currents. Our study aims to find measures to quantify the behaviour of external and internal currents and their time derivatives during large GIC events. Results of this study show that strong external currents have quite narrow directional distributions. Angular variation is larger for internal currents, and especially for their time derivatives. For external currents angular variation is larger at higher latitudes. Similar behaviour is not seen with internal currents.

How to cite: Kellinsalmi, M., Viljanen, A., Juusola, L., and Käki, S.: Dynamics of ionospheric and telluric currents during large events of geomagnetically induced currents, EGU General Assembly 2021, online, 19–30 Apr 2021, EGU21-812, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu21-812, 2021.

Geomagnetically Induced Currents (GIC) constitute an integral part of the space weather research and a subject of ever-growing attention for countries located in the low and middle latitudes. A series of recent studies highlights the importance of considering GIC risks for the Mediterranean region. Here, we exploit data from the HellENIc GeoMagnetic Array (ENIGMA), which is located in Greece, complemented by magnetic observatories in Italy, to calculate corresponding values of the GIC index, i.e., a proxy of the geoelectric field calculated entirely from geomagnetic field variations. We perform our analysis for the most intense magnetic storms (Dst<-150 nT) of solar cycle 24. Our results show a good correlation between the storm sudden commencement (SSC) and an increase of the GIC index value. These investigations indicate that despite the elevated amplitude of the GIC index the associated risk remains at low level for the power networks in Greece and Italy during the considered storm events.

How to cite: Boutsi, A. Z., Balasis, G., Daglis, I. A., Tsinganos, K., and Giannakis, O.: Investigation of the possibility of GIC development in Greece during the strongest magnetic storms of solar cycle 24, EGU General Assembly 2021, online, 19–30 Apr 2021, EGU21-8410, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu21-8410, 2021.

The electric currents flowing in the ionosphere change rapidly and a large amount of energy is dissipated in the auroral ionosphere during auroral substorms. An important part of the auroral current system are the auroral electrojets whose profiles can be estimated from magnetic field measurements from low Earth orbit satellites. We have combined electrojet data derived from the Swarm satellite mission of ESA with the substorm database derived from the SuperMAG ground network data. We organize the electrojet data in relation to the location of the onset and obtain statistics for the development of the integrated current and latitudinal location for the auroral electrojets relative to the onset. Especially we show that just after the onset the latitudinal location of the maximum of the westward electrojet determined from Swarm satellite data is mostly located close to the onset latitude in the local time sector of the onset regardless of where the onset happens.

How to cite: Käki, S., Viljanen, A., Juusola, L., and Kauristie, K.: Spatio-temporal development of large scale auroral electrojet currents relative to substorm onsets, EGU General Assembly 2021, online, 19–30 Apr 2021, EGU21-1083, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu21-1083, 2021.

Magnetic helicity, which is a measure of twist and linkage of magnetic field lines, is a useful quantity to investigate some processes occurring in space plasmas. In particular, there is a strong link between magnetic helicity, magnetic flux structures, turbulence and dissipation. We investigate the connection between the reduced magnetic helicity and the structure of field-aligned currents in the high-latitude ionosphere using high resolution (50 Hz) magnetic data collected on board the ESA Swarm constellation. We show the existence of a clear link between the multiscale coarse-grained structure of reduced magnetic helicity and the field-aligned currents. This finding strongly supports the idea that turbulence processes might be at the origin of the observed small-scale current structures. A discussion of the relevance of our results in the framework of the filamentary nature of the field-aligned current is also presented.

This work is supported by Italian PNRA under contract PNRA18_00289-A “Space weather in Polar Ionosphere: the Role of Turbulence ".

How to cite: De Michelis, P., Consolini, G., Alberti, T., Carbone, V., Tozzi, R., Coco, I., and Giannattasio, F.: On Magnetic Helicity and Field-Aligned Currents in the Polar Ionosphere, EGU General Assembly 2021, online, 19–30 Apr 2021, EGU21-12667, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu21-12667, 2021.

Solar flares are known to enhance the ionospheric electron density and thus influence the electric currents in the D- and E-region.  The geomagnetic disturbance caused by this current system is called a "crochet" or "SFE (solar flare effect)".  Crochets are observed at dayside low-latitudes with a peak near the subsolar region ("subsolar crochet"), in the nightside high-latitude auroral region with a peak where the geomagnetic disturbance pre-exists during solar illumination ("auroral crochet"), and in the cusp ("cusp crochet").  In addition, we recently found a new type of crochet on the dayside ionospheric current at high latitudes (European sector 70-75 geographic latitude/67-72 geomagnetic latitude) independent from the other crochets.  The new crochet is much more intense and longer in duration than the subsolar crochet and is detected even in AU index for about half the >X2 flares despite the unfavorable latitudinal coverage of the AE stations (~65 geomagnetic latitude) to detect this new crochet (Yamauchi et al., 2020).  

The signature is sometime s seen in AL, causing the crochet signature convoluting with substorms.  From a theoretical viewpoint, X-flares that enhances the ionospheric conductivity may influence the substorm activity, like the auroral crochet.  To understand the substorm-crochet relation in the dayside, we examined SuperMAG data for cases when the onset of the substorm-like AL (SML) behavior coincides with the crochet.  We commonly found a large counter-clockwise ∆B vortex centered at 13-15 LT, causing an AU peak during late afternoon and an AL peak near noon at higher latitudes than the high-latitude crochet.  In addition, we could recognize a clockwise ∆B vortex in the prenoon sector, causing another poleward ∆B, but this signature is not as clear as the afternoon vortex.  With such strong vortex features, it becomes similar to substorms except for its local time.  In some cases, the vortex expends to the nightside sector, where and when nightside onset starts, suggesting triggering of onset.  Thus, the crochet may behave like pseudo-onset at different latitude than midnight substorms, and may even trigger substorm onset.

How to cite: Yamauchi, M., Johnsen, M., Othani, S.-I., and Sormakov, D.: High-latitude crochet (Solar flare effect) as a trigger of pseud-substorm onset, EGU General Assembly 2021, online, 19–30 Apr 2021, EGU21-2741, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu21-2741, 2021.

The Earth’s magnetic field as measured from ground-based magnetometers is composed of a variety of fields generated by diverse sources, spanning a broad amplitude and frequency spectrum. Long-term variable sources induce smooth changes, whereas short-term variable sources are able to induce rapid spikes in the geomagnetic field. An important aspect of Space Weather research is to understand the contribution and impact of each of these sources. In particular, knowing the amplitude and frequency of steady-like sources, like diurnal variations, enables us to determine the impact of sudden and hazardous events such as solar storms. The basic approach to this challenge is to identify the quiet magnetic field information within the recorded time-varying signal.
In this work, we examine the variance of the magnetically quiet diurnal and semi-diurnal components of the geomagnetic field, as recorded by ground-based magnetic observatories of the INTERMAGNET network. These variations are extracted by applying appropriately designed digital filters on the geomagnetic field time series. The residual signal is analysed in terms of local time and seasonal variations for selected locations under quiet magnetic conditions. This approach allows us to evaluate the applicability of the introduced filtering method. The obtained results improve our understanding of the driving sources of quiet currents such as the Sq current and the variations of their distributions with respect to regular solar irradiance variations. They will also contribute to a better extraction and description of the remaining/residual signal related to solar wind stimuli (e.g. ICMEs, CIRs) causing magnetic storms.

How to cite: Haberle, V., Marchaudon, A., Blelly, P.-L., and Chambodut, A.: Local diurnal variations of the geomagnetic field during magnetically quiet conditions, EGU General Assembly 2021, online, 19–30 Apr 2021, EGU21-2169, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu21-2169, 2021.

In this work we will show the behavior of the horizontal component H of the Earth Magnetic Field (EMF) along the seasons during the period of solar cycle 24 lasting from 2009 to 2019. By means of  continuous measurements of geomagnetic components (X, Y) of the EMF, we compute the horizontal component H at the Earth’s surface. The data are recorded with a time resolution of one minute at Tamanrasset observatory in Algeria at the geographical coordinates of 22.79° North and 5.53° East. These data are available from the INTERMAGNET network. We find that the variation in amplitude of the hourly average of H component at low latitude changes from a season to another and it is greater at the maximum solar activity than at the minimum solar activity.

Keywords: Solar cycle 24, Season, Horizontal component H. 

How to cite: Bouderba, Y., Aganou, E., and Lemgharbi, A.: Seasonal behavior of H component during solar cycle 24, EGU General Assembly 2021, online, 19–30 Apr 2021, EGU21-7756, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu21-7756, 2021.

We show that changes in the magnetospheric ring current and auroral currents during the magnetic storms of March 2015 and June 2015, are recorded in several specific ways by ground magnetometers. The ring current changes are detected in geomagnetic field measurements of ground stations at magnetic mid-latitudes from -50 to +50 degrees. The auroral currents changes are detected at high magnetic latitudes from 50 to about 73 degrees. Finally, for stations between 73 and about 85 degrees the measurements of the ground magnetometers seem to be directly correlated with the convection electric field VB_South of the solar wind. Using the correlations among magnetic fields measured at stations ordered by latitude, a correlation diagram is obtained where the maximum correlation values for fields determined by the ring current form a distinct block. High-latitude magnetic fields from stations at higher latitudes, which are mainly determined by auroral currents, form a different block in the same diagram. This is in agreement with our earlier work using wavelet transforms on ground magnetic-field time series, where mid-latitude fields stations that are influenced mainly by the ring current, give a critical exponent greater than 2 while higher-latitude fields show a more complex dependence with two exponents. The maximum correlation values for mid-latitude fields correlated with the SYM-H index vary from 0.8 to 0.9, and, thus, we infer that those geomagnetic disturbances are mainly due to the ring current. The maximum correlations between the same fields and the solar wind VB_South vary from 0.5 to 0.7. Fields at magnetic latitudes between 50 and 73 degrees exhibit greater correlation values for the AL index rather than the SYM-H index. This is expected since in the auroral zone, the convection- and substorm-associated auroral electrojets contribute significantly to the deviation of the geomagnetic field from its quiet-time value. In this case, maximum correlations vary between 0.6 and 0.7 for auroral latitude stations when compared with AL, as opposed to 0.4–0.5 when compared with SYM-H. Our results show how different measures of ground geomagnetic variations reflect the time evolution of several magnetospheric current systems and of the solar wind – magnetosphere coupling.

How to cite: Pitsis, V., Balasis, G., Daglis, I., and Vassiliadis, D.: Identification of the ground signatures of magnetospheric current systems as a function of latitude during intense magnetic storms, EGU General Assembly 2021, online, 19–30 Apr 2021, EGU21-1436, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu21-1436, 2021.

The near-Earth environment is continuously changing by disturbances from external and internal sources. A combined research ecosystem is needed to be able to monitor short- and long-term changes and mitigate their societal effects. Observatories and large-scale infrastructures are the best way to guarantee continuous 24/7 observations and full-scale monitoring capability. Sodankylä Geophysical Observatory takes care of continuous geoenvironmental monitoring in Finland and together with national infrastructures such as FIN-EPOS and E2S enable extending and expanding the monitoring capability. European Plate Observing System of Finland (FIN-EPOS) and flexible instrument network of FIN-EPOS (FLEX-EPOS) will create a national pool of instruments including geophysical instruments targeted for solving topical questions of solid Earth physics. Scientific and new hardware building by FLEX-EPOS is essential in order to identify and reduce the impact of seismic, magnetic and geodetic hazards and understand the underlying processes.

New national infrastructure Earth-Space Research Ecosystem (E2S) will combine measurements from atmosphere to near-Earth and distant space. This combined infrastructure will enable resolving how the Arctic environment change over the seasons, years, decades and centuries. We target our joint efforts to improve the situational awareness in the near-Earth and space environments, and in the Arctic for enhancing safety on ground and in space. This presentation will give details on the large-scale Earth-space infrastructures and research ecosystems and will give examples on how they can improve the safety of society.

How to cite: Tanskanen, E., Raita, T., Tammi, J., Pulliainen, J., Koivula, H., Ulich, T., Hynönen, R., Kukkonen, I., and Korja, A.: New Earth-space infrastructures enable full-scale monitoring capability, EGU General Assembly 2021, online, 19–30 Apr 2021, EGU21-15343, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu21-15343, 2021.

Monitoring the plasmasphere is an important task to achieve in the Space Weather context. A consolidated technique consists of remotely inferring the equatorial plasma mass density in the inner magnetosphere using Field Line Resonance (FLR) frequency estimates derived from Ultra-Low Frequency (ULF) measurements. FLR frequencies can be obtained via cross-phase analysis of magnetic signals recorded from pairs of latitude separated stations. In the last years, machine learning (ML) has been successfully applied in Space Weather, but this is the first attempt to estimate FLR frequencies with these techniques. EXtreme Gradient Boosting (XGB) is a recent ensemble-based algorithm that is resulted in being highly efficient in regression/classification competitions and many real-world applications. Here we employ XGB for identifying FLR frequencies by using measurements of the European quasi-Meridional Magnetometer Array (EMMA). Our algorithm takes as input the 30-min cross-phase spectra of magnetic signals and returns the FLR frequency as output; we evaluated the algorithm performance on four different station pairs from L=2.4 to L=5.5. Results show that XGB algorithm can be a robust and accurate method to achieve this goal. Its performances slightly decrease with increasing latitude and tend to deteriorate during nighttime. However, at high latitudes, the error increases during highly disturbed geomagnetic conditions such as the storm's main phase. Finally, we compare the equatorial plasmaspheric mass density obtained by XGB estimates with the density profiles by Del Corpo et al. (2019) for a case study, the geomagnetic storm of the 1^st June 2013. Our approach may represent a prominent space weather tool included in an automatic monitoring system of the plasmasphere. This work represents only a preliminary step in this direction; applying this technique on a more extensive data set and on more pairs of stations is straightforward and necessary to create more robust and accurate models.

How to cite: Foldes, R., Del Corpo, A., Pietropaolo, E., and Vellante, M.: XGBoost Algorithm for Estimating Equatorial Plasmaspheric Mass Density Using ULF Wave Measurements, EGU General Assembly 2021, online, 19–30 Apr 2021, EGU21-10693, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu21-10693, 2021.

The magnetic component of electromagnetic signals in the Extremely Low Frequencies (ELF) has been rarely observed from space. The Swarm satellites have the capability of observing part of this spectral band during burst sessions of the Absolute Scalar Magnetometer (ASM), when the sampling frequency of the instrument is raised to 250 Hz. Burst sessions of one week duration have been acquired regularly since 2019. Swarm satellites drift slowly in local time, therefore it has been possible to progressively acquire burst data to cover all hours at all latitudes. This is a unique opportunity at Low Earth Orbits (LEO) in recent years.

This study focuses on whistlers excited by lightning strikes generated by strong storm systems in the troposphere. The ELF component of the lightning signal propagates in the neutral atmosphere at very long distances. We used data from the ground stations of the World ELF Radiolocation Array (WERA) in order to estimate lightning locations and intensity for remarkable events. Part of the lightning signal penetrates into the ionosphere, where the ionospheric plasma produces its dispersion, depending on the spatial distribution of the plasma and the direction of the magnetic field.

We selected events to simulate their propagation through the ionosphere, using ionosonde data, IRI Real-Time Assimilative Mapping (IRTAM) and International Reference Ionosphere (IRI) model as backgrounds, along with the latest version of the International Geomagnetic Reference Field (IGRF). This technique allows to use these signals to sound the ionosphere and validate ionospheric models.

A database of whistler occurrences and parameters has been constructed and a new Swarm L2 product has been defined to make this data accessible to the scientific community.

How to cite: Coïsson, P., Truhlik, V., Mlynarczyk, J., Hulot, G., Brocco, L., Bonnot, O., Vigneron, P., Burešová, D., Chum, J., Rzonca, P., and Kulak, A.: Observation and modelling of whistlers in the ELF as observed by Swarm satellites during regular ASM burst sessions, EGU General Assembly 2021, online, 19–30 Apr 2021, EGU21-12740, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu21-12740, 2021.