CaltechAUTHORS
Published April 22, 2011 | Version Published
Journal Article Open

The rarity of terrestrial gamma-ray flashes

Creators

  • 1. ROR icon University of California, Santa Cruz
  • 2. ROR icon University of California, Berkeley
  • 3. ROR icon Florida Institute of Technology
  • 4. ROR icon University of Washington
  • 5. ROR icon California Institute of Technology
  • 6. ROR icon Duke University
  • 7. ROR icon Marshall Space Flight Center

Abstract

We report on the first search for Terrestrial Gamma-ray Flashes (TGFs) from altitudes where they are thought to be produced. The Airborne Detector for Energetic Lightning Emissions (ADELE), an array of gamma-ray detectors, was flown near the tops of Florida thunderstorms in August/September 2009. The plane passed within 10 km horizontal distance of 1213 lightning discharges and only once detected a TGF. If these discharges had produced TGFs of the same intensity as those seen from space, every one should have been seen by ADELE. Separate and significant nondetections are established for intracloud lightning, negative cloud-to-ground lightning, and narrow bipolar events. We conclude that TGFs are not a primary triggering mechanism for lightning. We estimate the TGF-to-flash ratio to be on the order of 10^(−2) to 10^(−3) and show that TGF intensities cannot follow the well-known power-law distribution seen in earthquakes and solar flares, due to our limits on the presence of faint events.

Additional Information

© 2011 American Geophysical Union. Received 2 February 2011; revised 11 March 2011; accepted 15 March 2011; published 22 April 2011. We thank Allen Schanot, the managing scientist of our field campaign from NCAR/EOL; the other NCAR scientists who filled this role earlier or helped us with GV data: Pavel Romashkin, Jorgen Jensen, and Jeff Stith; and the EOL pilots, engineers, and technicians who provided exemplary support. We also thank Stan Heckman of Weatherbug/AWS, not only for providing sferic data, but for significant personal attention in helping us interpret the data. ADELE was funded by NSF Major Research Instrumentation grant ATM–0619941. Our simulation work was supported by NSF grant ATM–0846609.

Attached Files

Published - Smith2011p13839Geophys_Res_Lett.pdf

Files

Smith2011p13839Geophys_Res_Lett.pdf

Files (159.3 kB)

Name Size
md5:3c894ac4ca384a2c0160f921935f8a20
159.3 kB Preview Download

Additional details

Identifiers

Eprint ID
23776
Resolver ID
CaltechAUTHORS:20110524-100820062

Funding

NSF Major Research Instrumentation
ATM-0619941
NSF
ATM-0846609

Dates

Created
2011-05-24
Created from EPrint's datestamp field
Updated
2021-11-09
Created from EPrint's last_modified field

Caltech Custom Metadata

Caltech groups
Space Radiation Laboratory