Development of auroral streamers in association with localized impulsive injections to the inner magnetotail

Abstract

During continuous magnetospheric activity it is not uncommon to observe narrow (in MLT) transient particle injections (duration about 1-2 minute at E=100 keV and local time extent ≤ 1 hour MLT) in the nightside part of geosynchronous orbit. Using global UV images from POLAR spacecraft we analyze the development of auroral activity on December 22, 1996 during a sequence of such injections observed by two LANL spacecraft. We found that narrow transient injections are associated with specific localized auroral form, the auroral streamer, which develops in this local time sector. The streamer first appear as a bright spot in the poleward part of the double oval ≈ 2-5 minutes before the geosynchronous plasma injection, and then develops equatorward, reaching in many cases the equatorward boundary of the UV aurora. We interprete the observations as evidence that some high speed flow bursts (BBFs) of small cross-tail extent (less than 1 h MLT), formed in the distant tail or midtail, can intrude as close to the Earth as the geosynchronous distance before being stopped.