Shock Properties and Associated Characteristics of Solar Energetic Particles in the 2017 September 10 Ground-level Enhancement Event

Abstract

Abstract The solar eruption on 2017 September 10 was accompanied by a fast coronal mass ejection (∼3000 km s−1) and produced a ground-level enhancement (GLE) event at Earth. Multiple-viewpoint remote sensing observations are used to find the three-dimensional (3D) structure of the shock. We determine the shock parameters by combining the 3D shock kinematics and the solar wind properties obtained from a global magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) simulation, in order to compare them with the characteristics of the solar energetic particles (SEPs). We extract the magnetic connectivities of the observers from the MHD simulation and find that L1 was magnetically connected to the shock flank (rather than the nose). Further analysis shows that this shock flank propagates through the heliospheric current sheet (HCS). The weak magnetic field and relatively dense plasma around the HCS result in a large Mach number of the shock, which leads to efficient particle acceleration even at the shock flank. We conclude that the interaction between the shock and HCS provides a potential mechanism for production of the GLE event. The comparison between the shock properties and the characteristics of SEPs suggests an efficient particle acceleration in a wide spatial range by the shock propagating through the highly inhomogeneous coronal medium.