Monitoring potential ionosphere changes caused by Van earthquake (Mw 7.2) using GNSS measurements

Abstract. Several scientists from different disciplines have studied earthquakes for many years. As a result of these studies, it has been proposed that some changes take place in the ionosphere layer before, during or after earthquakes, and the ionosphere should be monitored in earthquake prediction studies. This study investigates the changes in the ionosphere created by the earthquake with magnitude of Mw=7.2 in the northwest of the Lake Erçek which is located to the north of the province of Van in Turkey on 23 October 2011 and at 1.41 pm local time (−3 UT) with the epicenter of 38.758° N, 43.360° E using the TEC values obtained by the Global Ionosphere Models (GIM) created by IONOLAB-TEC and CODE. In order to see whether the ionospheric changes obtained by the study in question were caused by the earthquake or not, the ionospheric conditions were studied by utilizing indices providing information on solar and geomagnetic activities (F10.7 cm, Kp, Dst). As a result of the statistical test on the TEC values obtained from the both models, positive and negative anomalies were obtained for the times before, on the day of and after the earthquake, and the reasons for these anomalies are discussed in detail in the last section of the study. As the ionospheric conditions in the analyzed days were highly vibrant, it was thought that the anomalies were caused by geomagnetic effects, solar activity and the earthquake. The authors believe that interdisciplinary studies are needed to distinguish the earthquake-related part of the anomalies in question.