Comment on "The night when the auroral and equatorial ionospheres converged" by Martinis, C., J. Baumgardner, M. Mendillo, J. Wroten, A. Coster, and L. Paxton

Abstract

Intense OI 630.0 nm emission depletions were detected over Mexico by an all sky imager during the main phase of the geomagnetic storm on 1 June 2013 (minimum Dst index: ？119 nT). Those emission depletions were interpreted to be associated with equatorial plasma bubbles [Martinis et al., 2015]. If bubbles were responsible for those middle-latitude emission depletions, they would have been extreme bubbles which extended over 40° magnetic latitudes and 7000 km in altitude at the magnetic equator. However, a few factors challenge this interpretation. First, the emission depletions detected over Mexico showed westward drift, whereas the equatorial ionosphere including bubbles drifted eastward on that night. Second, the middle-latitude emission depletions were tilted westward with respect to the geographic meridian, but the westward tilt of bubbles was not identified. Third, the growth of bubbles was not evident when the middle-latitude emission depletions grew. The westward tilt and westward propagation of the middle-latitude emission depletions are consistent with the characteristics of medium-scale traveling ionospheric disturbances (MSTIDs) observed over the United States on that night. Thus, the emission depletions over Mexico can be interpreted to be the signature of MSTIDs.