Downward Terrestrial Gamma-ray Flash observed in Winter Thunderstorm

Abstract

During a winter thunderstorm on 2017 November 24, a strong burst of gamma rays with energies up to $\sim$10~MeV was detected coincident with a lightning discharge, by scintillation detectors installed at Kashiwazaki-Kariwa Nuclear Power Station at sea level in Japan. The burst had a sub-second duration, which is suggestive of photoneutron productions. The leading part of the burst was resolved into four intense gamma-ray bunches, each coincident with a low-frequency radio pulse. These bunches were separated by 0.7--1.5~ms, with a duration of $\ll$1~ms each. Thus, the present burst may be considered as a ``downward" terrestrial gamma-ray flash (TGF), which is analogous to up-going TGFs observed from space. Although the scintillation detectors were heavily saturated by these bunches, the total dose associated with them was successfully measured by ionization chambers, employed by nine monitoring posts surrounding the power plant. From this information and Monte Carlo simulations, the present downward TGF is suggested to have taken place at an altitude of 2500 $\pm$ 500~m, involving $8_{-4}^{+8}\times 10^{18}$ avalanche electrons with energies above 1~MeV. This number is comparable to those in up-going TGFs.

arXiv comment6 pages, 4 figures, accepted for publication in Physical Review Letters

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Cited by in corpus (6)

• The prolonged gamma ray enhancement and the short radiation burst events observed in thunderstorms at Tien Shan
• Interferometric imaging of Intensely Radiating Negative Leaders
• Photoneutron Detection in Lightning by Gadolinium Orthosilicate Scintillators
• Isotope production in thunderstorms
• Catalog of Gamma-ray Glows during Four Winter Seasons in Japan
• Lightning as a natural accelerator of relativistic particles and a source of synchrotron radiation