Concentric traveling ionospheric disturbances triggered by the launch of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket

Abstract

Abstract We report the first observation of concentric traveling ionospheric disturbances (CTIDs) triggered by the launch of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket on 17 January 2016. The rocket‐triggered ionospheric disturbances show shock acoustic wave signature in the time rate change (time derivative) of total electron content (TEC), followed by CTIDs in the 8–15 min band‐pass filtering of TEC. The CTIDs propagated northward with phase velocity of 241–617 m/s and reached distances more than 1000 km away from the source on the rocket trajectory. The wave characteristics of CTIDs with periods of 10.5–12.7 min and wavelength ~ 200–400 km agree well with the gravity wave dispersion relation. The optimal wave source searching and gravity wave ray tracing technique suggested that the CTIDs have multiple sources which are originated from ~38–120 km altitude before and after the ignition of the second‐stage rocket, ~200 s after the rocket was launched.