Origin of the Extended Mars Radar Blackout of September 2017

Beatriz Sánchez‐cano 1 Pierre‐louis Blelly 2 Mark Lester 1 Olivier Witasse 3 Marco Cartacci 4 Roberto Orosei 5 Hermann Opgenoorth 6, 1 Robert Lillis 7 François Leblanc 8 Stephen Milan 1 Philip Conroy 3 Nicolas Floury 3 John M.C. Plane 9 Andrea Cicchetti 4 Raffaella Noschese 4 Andrew J. Kopf 10
1 RSPP - Radio and Space Plasma Physics Group [Leicester]
University of Leicester
2 IRAP - Institut de recherche en astrophysique et planétologie
3 ESTEC - European Space Research and Technology Centre
4 IAPS - Istituto di Astrofisica e Planetologia Spaziali
5 IRA - Istituto di Radioastronomia
6 Department of Physics [Umeå]
7 SSL - Space Sciences Laboratory [Berkeley]
8 HEPPI - LATMOS
LATMOS - Laboratoire Atmosphères, Milieux, Observations Spatiales
9 School of Chemistry [Leeds]
10 Department of Physics and Astronomy [Iowa City]
Abstract : The Mars Advanced Radar for Subsurface and Ionosphere Sounding (MARSIS) onboard Mars Express, which operates between 0.1 and 5.5 MHz, suffered from a complete blackout for 10 days in September 2017 when observing on the nightside (a rare occurrence). Moreover, the Shallow Radar (SHARAD) onboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, which operates at 20 MHz, also suffered a blackout for three days when operating on both dayside and nightside. We propose that these blackouts are caused by solar energetic particles of few tens of keV and above associated with an extreme space weather event between 10 and 22 September 2017, as recorded by the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN (MAVEN) mission. Numerical simulations of energetic electron precipitation predict that a lower O2+ nighttime ionospheric layer of magnitude ~1010 m−3 peaking at ~90‐km altitude is produced. Consequently, such a layer would absorb radar signals at high frequencies and explain the blackouts. The peak absorption level is found to be at 70‐km altitude.
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Beatriz Sánchez‐cano, Pierre‐louis Blelly, Mark Lester, Olivier Witasse, Marco Cartacci, et al.. Origin of the Extended Mars Radar Blackout of September 2017. Journal of Geophysical Research Space Physics, American Geophysical Union/Wiley, 2019, 124 (6), pp.4556-4568. ⟨10.1029/2018JA026403⟩. ⟨insu-02125889⟩

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