Fast electric field change pulses location technique

Abstract

Using both fast and slow electric field change sensors and field mill, multi-station observations on lightning flashes in Chinese Inland Plateau was conducted during the summer of 2004. All of the stations were synchronized by GPS with a time-resolution of ±50 ns. Using the different time of arrival (DTOA), a lightning radiation location technique, based on the fast electric field change sensor, was developed. Radiation pulses in the five intra-cloud (IC) lightning discharges which occurred on 20 <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">th</sup> August and cloud-to-ground (CG) lightning discharges which occurred on 16 <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">th</sup> July were analyzed. The results indicated that the technique developed could effectively locate the lightning radiation sources. Furthermore, the lightning discharges were compared with the Doppler radar data. Results showed that the radiation sources were well associated with the storm development.