Ionospheric response to annular and partial solar eclipse of 29 April 2014 in Antarctica and Australian Regions

Abstract

An annular and partial solar eclipse was observed on 29 April 2014 over Australian and Antarctic regions. In this study we have analyzed the ionospheric response of this solar eclipse event. We have done a comprehensive study to find out the changes that occurred in various ionospheric parameters during the solar eclipse event over Australia and Antarctic region. We selected four Australian stations Brisbane (27.5◦S, 152.9◦E), Canberra (35.3◦S, 149.1◦E), Hobart (42.9◦S, 147.3◦E) and Perth (31.955◦S, 115.859◦E) as well as one Antarctic station Mawson (70.6455◦S, 131.2573◦E). We have studied the changes in the E and F ionospheric layers using the ground based observations at these stations. From our analysis we found that there occurred a decrease in the critical frequencies of sporadic E (foEs) and F (foF2) layers during the time eclipse was in progress at all the four Australian stations while as at Antarctic the value of foF2 recorded an enhancement. At the same time an increase in the corresponding heights of these layers (h′Es , h′F2) was also observed. This is the e-book version of the article, published in Russian Journal of Earth Sciences (doi:10.2205/2015ES000548). It is generated from the original source file using LaTeX’s epub.cls class.