Ionospheric response to major storm of 17th March 2015 using multi-instrument data over low latitude station Kolhapur (16.8°N, 74.2°E, 10.6°dip. Lat.)

The optical observations of ionospheric and mesospheric CH 630.0 nm, OI 557.7 nm along with OH emission carried out from low latitude Indian station, Kolhapur (16.8 degrees N, 74.2 degrees E) using CCD based all-sky camera system. The features of night airglow variations observed during the period of a strong geomagnetic storm, which commenced on March 17, 2015, at similar to 04:30 UT (10:00 IST (Indian Standard Time = UT + 5.5 h)). Dst of similar to-222 nT was seen in this storm suggest that this is among the strongest. The 0! 630.0 nm images on 16, 17 and 18 March show the development of Equatorial Plasma Bubbles (EPBs) and bright intensity regions in OI 630.0 nm emission. Generally, EPBs move from west to east direction but it moved in reverse direction on the strong magnetically disturbed night. The EPBs drift velocity was less by similar to 100 m/s than the velocity measured on magnetically quite night 16-17 March 2015. The bright intensity regions are also observed in 01 557.7 nm airglow, but there is no intensity enhancement seen in OH emission. It is also observed that the CH 630.0 nm intensity variation well matches with the GPS VTEC variation for PRN-2. The reversal in EPBs drift velocity and the nightglow intensity variations due to the strong magnetic storm are discussed. (C) 2018 Published by Elsevier Ltd on behalf of COSPAR.