Persistence of Planetary Waves in the Lower Ionosphere

The transient planetary waves in the atmosphere and ionosphere seem to occur in the form of bursts of a couple of waves with limited persistence. To study persistence of planetary wave events in the lower ionosphere, data from two radio paths from Central Europe are used, Luxembourg – Panská Ves (f = 6.09 MHz, f_eq = 2.1-2.2 MHz) and Deutschlandfunk – Panská Ves (f = 1539 kHz, f_eq = 650-700 kHz). The absorption along the former radio paths is formed very predominantly at altitudes of about 90-100 km, whereas the latter absorption is formed mostly at altitudes of about 85-90 km. The persistence of planetary wave type oscillations is studied in three period bands centred at 5, 10 and 16 days. Waves with period T near 5 days reveal a typical persistence of wave events around 5 cycles. Waves with T = 10 days are less persistent with a typical persistence of 3-4 cycles. The typical persistence of waves T = 16 days is no more than 3 cycles. In terms of number of cycles, the persistence of oscillations evidently decreases with increasing period. On the other hand, in terms of number of days, the persistence seems rather to increase with increasing period.