Pre-seismic ionospheric anomalies detected before the 2016 Taiwan earthquake

TL;DR

This study identifies ionospheric TEC anomalies as potential earthquake precursors, detected within an hour before the 2016 Taiwan earthquake using ground-based GNSS data processing.

Contribution

It demonstrates the detection of pre-seismic ionospheric anomalies from TEC data, providing evidence for earthquake prediction methods.

Findings

TEC anomalies observed within 1 hour before the earthquake

Anomalies detected using ground-based GNSS stations in Taiwan

Supports ionospheric monitoring as a tool for earthquake precursors

Abstract

On Feb. 5 2016 (UTC), an earthquake with moment magnitude 6.4 occurred in southern Taiwan, known as the 2016 (Southern) Taiwan earthquake. In this study, evidences of seismic earthquake precursors for this earthquake event are investigated. Results show that ionospheric anomalies in Total Electric Content (TEC) can be observed before the earthquake. These anomalies were obtained by processing TEC data, where such TEC data are calculated from phase delays of signals observed at densely arranged ground-based stations in Taiwan for Global Navigation Satellite Systems. This shows that such anomalies were detected within 1 hour before the event.