Special case of ionospheric day-to-day variability associated with earthquake preparation

The problem of ionospheric variability is regarded from the point of view of spatial and temporal correlations between the GPS TEC variations derived from the neighboring GPS receiver records. It is demonstrated that the technique of the spatial correlation coefficient developed earlier to reveal the ionospheric variations induced by seismic activity sometimes is not very reliable. The new index of the local ionospheric variability is proposed describing the spread of GPS TEC within the given area. It is tested for periods of geomagnetic disturbances and periods of several days preceding the strong (M >= 6) earthquakes occuring within the area of GPS receiver's network. It is shown that the new index is a promising indicator of the earthquake preparation process, it increases few (5-10) days before the seismic shocks and comes back to normal state after the earthquake. During the periods of increased geomagnetic activity the index does not show such variability. (C) 2006 COSPAR. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.