Determining the drift velocity of ionospheric irregularities by analyzing three mutually orthogonal projections of the HF radio signal field vector

摘要

This paper presents results of an experimental verification of our earlier suggested spectral-polarization method of measuring the interference pattern velocity by analyzing three mutually orthogonal projections of the radio signal field vector using a single receiving antenna. The measurements were made on an HF radio path about 100 km in length, with a simultaneous monitoring of the ionospheric situation using an oblique-incidence sounding chirp-ionosonde. In an effort to eliminate multipath effects, in the analysis we used nighttime intervals, for which a stable one-mode reflected radio signal was observed. It is shown that the proposed method gives the mean values of the azimuth and zenith angle which differ by no more than 2 to 5 deg from calculated values. Mean values of the velocity of travelling ionospheric disturbances (of order 50 m/s) and propagation directions (north-westward changing to northward by the morning hours) obtained for these time intervals are consistent with existing published data.