Journal
ADVANCES IN SPACE RESEARCH
Volume 59, Issue 2, Pages 532-541Publisher
ELSEVIER SCI LTD
DOI: 10.1016/j.asr.2016.09.012
Keywords
Ionosphere; Rocket launch; Total electron content; Neutral winds
Categories
Funding
- Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute
- National Research Council of Science & Technology (NST), Republic of Korea [2016120003] Funding Source: Korea Institute of Science & Technology Information (KISTI), National Science & Technology Information Service (NTIS)
Ask authors/readers for more resources
A rocket called Kwangmyongsong-4 was launched from North Korea at 00:30 UT on February 7, 2016. We investigated ionospheric total electron content (TEC) depletions induced by the rocket using the Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) stations in South Korea. A sudden depletion in TEC variations appeared 6 min after the rocket launch. The drops in slant TEC exceeded 17 TEC unit (TECU) and those in vertical TEC were approximately 7 TECU. It is remarkable that the TEC drop by the 2016 Kwangmyongsong-4 rocket is larger (almost by three times) than that by the 2012 Unha-3 rocket. There are the differences of the background TEC values at the 2012 and the 2016 cases. These results suggest that the difference of the background electron density affects the magnitude of TEC depletion. The horizonal velocity of the rocket was 1.6 km/s, which was estimated from horizontal distances with an initial time of TEC disturbances. However, the 2012 Unha-3 rocket (similar to 2.5 km/s) moved faster horizontally than the 2016 Kwangmyongsong-4 rocket. Furthermore, when the rocket moved from high latitudes to low latitudes, TEC disturbances reduced gradually, and then, the depletion persisted for a longer time at the west side (the right side of southern direction). (C) 2016 COSPAR. Published by Elsevier Ltd.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available