Statistics of Ionospheric Storms Using GPS TEC Measurements Between 2002 and 2014 in Jeju, Korea

Abstract

Using the Total Electron Content (TEC) data from the Global Navigation Service System (GNSS) site in Jeju, operated by the Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute (geographic location: 33.3° N, 126.5° E; geomagnetic location: 23.6° N) for 2002– 2014 in Korea, the results of the statistical analysis of positive and negative ionospheric storms are presented for the first time. In this paper, ionospheric storms are defined as turbulences that exceed 50% of the percentage differential Global Positioning System (GPS) TEC ratio (ΔTEC) with monthly median GPS TEC. During the period of observations, the total number of positive ionospheric storms (ΔTEC > 50%) was 170, which is greater than five times the number of negative ionospheric storms (ΔTEC < - 50%) of 33. The numbers of ionospheric storms recorded during solar cycles 23 and 24 were 134 and 69, respectively. Both positive and negative ionospheric storms showed yearly variation with solar activity during solar cycle 23, but during solar cycle 24, the occurrence of negative ionospheric storms did not show any particular trend with solar activity. This result indicates that the ionosphere is actively perturbed during solar cycle 23, whereas it is relatively quiet during solar cycle 24. The monthly variations of the ionospheric storms were not very clear although there seems to be stronger occurrence during solstice than during equinox. We also investigated the variations of GPS positioning accuracy caused by ionospheric storms during November 7–10, 2004. During this storm period, the GPS positioning accuracies from a single frequency receiver are 3.26 m and 2.97 m on November 8 and 10, respectively, which is much worse than the quiet conditions on November 7 and 9 with the accuracy of 1.54 m and 1.69 m, respectively.

Keywords

• GPS TEC
• ionospheric storm
• GPS position accuracy