Abstract:
In this paper, the equatorial plasma bubbles (EPBs) of March 30
th, 2014 were studied using airglow images of 630 nm emission and observations of VHF radar over Hainan Fuke Station (19.5°N, 109.1°E) from the Meridian Project, digisonde over Hainan Sanya Station (18.4°N, 109.6°E), and data of C/NOFS. In this case, the morphological features and evolution processes in detail were analyzed. The results showed that there were a group of EPBs during the night. Nine EPBs were observed in this case. These EPBs occurred after sunset, lasting after midnight. The lifetime is about eight hours (from ~20: 15 LT to ~ 04: 15 LT). These EPBs moved from west to east during the night. Their longitudinal ranges are more than 1200 km. East-west ranges of EPB group are more than 2900 km. Besides, two EPBs (b5 and b6) showed a merging process. Portion of b6 merged into the b5 and then formed one EPB. When those plasma bubbles were observed by the all-sky imager, corresponding range spread F and plume irregularities also were simultaneously observed by the digisonde and VHF radar, respectively. Meanwhile, observation from C/NOFS also showed plasma depletion. Evolutions of these EPBs were simultaneously observed by optical equipment (all-sky imager) and radio equipment (VHF radar and digisonde) of ground-based measurements, and C/NOFS satellite.