Anomalous phenomena on HF radio paths during geomagnetic disturbances

Abstract

We analyze ionospheric oblique sounding data on three high-latitude and one high-latitude–midlatitude HF radio paths for February 15 and 16, 2014, when two substorms and one magnetic storm occurred. We investigate cases of anomalous propagation of signals: their reflection from sporadic layer Es, lateral reflections, type “M” or “N” modes, the presence of traveling ionospheric disturbances, and the diffusivity of signals and triplets. The most significant results are the following. In geomagnetically undisturbed times, sporadic Es-layers with reduced maximum observed frequencies (MOFEs) on three high-latitude paths were observed in both days. The values of MOFEs during disturbances are large, which leads to the screening of other oblique sounding signals reflected from the ionosphere. On all four paths, the most frequently traveling ionospheric disturbances due to the terminator were observed in quiet hours from 03:00 to 15:00 UT on the first day and from 06:00 to 13:00 UT on the second day of the experiment. In addition, both the sunset terminator and the magnetic storm on the high-latitude–mid-latitude path were found to generate traveling ionospheric disturbances jointly. No such phenomenon was found on high-latitude paths.