HR: 11:20h
AN: SH52A-04    [Abstracts]
TI: Survey of interplanetary shock characteristics
AU: * Kasper, J C
EM: jck@mit.edu
AU: Lazarus, A J
EM: ajl@space.mit.edu
AF: Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 77 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, MA 02139 United States
AU: Szabo, A
EM: adam.szabo-1@nasa.gov
AF: Goddard Space Flight Center, Laboratory for Solar and Space Physics, Greenbelt, MD 20771 United States
AU: Ogilvie, K W
EM: keith.w.ogilvie@nasa.gov
AF: Goddard Space Flight Center, Laboratory for Solar and Space Physics, Greenbelt, MD 20771 United States
AU: Skoug, R
EM: rskoug@lanl.gov
AF: Los Alamos National Laboratory, Mail Stop D466, Los Alamos, NM 87545 United States
AU: Steinberg, J T
EM: jsteinberg@lanl.gov
AF: Los Alamos National Laboratory, Mail Stop D466, Los Alamos, NM 87545 United States
AU: Smith, C
EM: chuck@briaxa.sr.unh.edu]
AF: University of New Hampshire, Room 207 Morse Hall, 39 College Road, Durham, NH 03824 United States
AB: We report on a comparison of more than one hundred interplanetary shocks observed by both the Wind and ACE spacecraft. For each event, we use single spacecraft analysis methods such as the full Rankine-Hugoniot jump relations and the simpler velocity and magnetic coplanarity techniques to determine the shock orientation, speed, and assorted mach numbers and angles. We present a comparison of the properties of the shocks as a function of the separation between the spacecraft to determine the accuracy of the analysis methods and the non-planarity of IP shocks. The accuracy of the derived shock parameters and the non-planarity of the shock fronts are quantified by comparing the observed shock transit time between the spacecraft with predicted transit times calculated from the derived shock properties. The average timing errors for a given analysis method is the same using the Wind or ACE dataset; The Ranking-Hugoniot method performs best, with an RMS timing error of two minutes. We have studied the non-planarity of the shocks by comparing the implied radius of curvature determined by the difference between the two derived normals with the separation of the spacecraft. The variation is consistent with a five-degree error in shock direction and a typical radius of curvature of 0.1-0.3 AU. The shock parameters are made available through an online database (1). (1) http://space.mit.edu/home/jck/shockdb/shockdb.html
UR: http://space.mit.edu/home/jck/shockdb/shockdb.html
DE: 2101 Coronal mass ejections (7513)
DE: 2111 Ejecta, driver gases, and magnetic clouds
DE: 2139 Interplanetary shocks
DE: 7537 Solar and stellar variability (1650)
DE: 7924 Forecasting (2722)
SC: SPA-Solar and Heliospheric Physics [SH]
MN: Fall Meeting 2005