Workshop Events

This page contains details (and plots) of events participants have submitted for discussion at the workshop. Please take a look at any that interest you, and if you have any data you think might aid discussion and wish to post before the start of the workshop let the local organising committee know and we'll put it online here.

List of Events

2006 Tail Season Event List (Andrei Runov)

I would invite participants to discuss Cluster observations during 2006 tail season (July - October). No specific events were selected so far.

The list and overview plots are available here (link to IWF).

WHISPER plots are available here.

If somebody is interested by some particular time interval, please let me know and I'll prepare more detailed overview plots, including CIS ET diagrams, ion distribution functions, etc. If you contact the local organising committee as well, we will provide electron data for the interval.

Walter Heikkila

• Event: Isolated substorm and large plasmoid

• Date: 2002-09-11

• Time: 1600-1800 UT

• Datasets used: RAPID, PEACE, FGM, CIS, EFW, WHISPER

• New event.

The onset of an isolated substorm of 2002/09/11 began at 1600 UT in northern Finland (Kilpisjarvi). Cluster was near apogee -19 Re at midnight at z = -2 Re. It saw a decreasing value of Bz from 15 to 5 nT until it apparently crossed a shock at 1622 UT and entered into a plasmoid for over an hour. RAPID data shows an immediate response with high fluxes of electrons and ions with high energies which lasted until 1740 UT. The data from the 4 s/c showed a nested structure. All instruments showed unique data (FGM, EFW, CIS, PEACE, WHISPER). A remarkable event! Analysis by all instruments would enlighten the nature of plasmoids, both is substorms as well as in solar flares.

Available plots: Event Overview (PPT)

Andrei Runov

• Event: Current sheet thinning & flow reversal

• Date: 2005-08-28

• Time: 2300-2400 UT

• Extension of previous work/discussion.

The event was previously discussed during 4th Cluster Tail workshop in Toulouse, and during 1st and 2nd EUROPLANET Cluster/GBO workshops in IWF/Graz and MSSL, respectively. A set of auroral activations (PBI, pseudo-breakup, substorm) was detected by IMAGE FUV. Cluster was located in the central plasma sheet at X~-18 RE. Dynamic thinning of the magnetotail current sheet and intensive flow reversal from -800 to 800 km/s were observed during 2330 - 2350 UT. A good conjuncton with the MIRACLE magnetometer network enable to study ionospheric signatures of the flow reversal.

The scientific questions to be addressed: Do we observe particles (ion and electron) signatures of reconnection during the flow reversal?

Available plots: Event Overview (HTML)

Ilya Alexeev

• Event: High Latitude Substorm

• Date: 2004-02-06

• Time: 0600-0800 UT

• Datasets used: PEACE, FGM, CIS, Ground-based, potentially IMAGE, RAPID

• New Event

High latitude substorm, during recovery phase Cluster spacecraft, being in a perigee, samples closed field lines deep in the polar cap (~82 MLAT). Dispersed ion signatures were detected at the same time.
Questions:
-What causes high latitude substorms and what are peculiar features of such substorms?
-What is the origin of observed ion dispersed structures?

Top

Yoshihiro Asano

• Event: Cluster-Geotail Conjunctions

• Date: 2006-09-06 & 2006-10-28

• Time: 0900-1200 UT

• Datasets used: FGM, CIS, Geotail

• New Event

Cluster observations of the dipolarization is briefly introduced with near-tail Geotail observations. Timing difference (simultaneity) of the magnetic field variation and appearance of the fast flows in the 1-2 Re separation are examined as well as the current sheet structure.

Top

Andrew Walsh

• Event: Cluster-Doublestar Substorm Studies

• Date: 2005-09-21 & 2005-09-09

• Time: 1200-1400 UT

• Datasets used: FGM, PEACE, CIS, Geotail, IMAGE, potentially geosynchronous

• New Event

Cluster and Double Star are used to investigate timing of substorm phenomena on two occasions. The 20050921 event is an example of a substorm involving more than one auroral activation, while the 20050909 event is an example of a substorm triggered by a solar wind shock, observed by Geotail which was situated outside the bow shock on the dayside.

Top