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SpaceX rocket launch creates 60 kilometre-wide hole in Earth’s ionosphere
March 27, 2018
New Delhi: SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket launched on August 24, 2017 has created a massive hole in the Earth’s ionosphere.
The rocket built by SpaceX was launched to take a satellite to orbit.
A new study suggests that the rocket launch has punched a temporary hole – which extends between around 60 kilometre – in the ionosphere, a part of the Earth’s upper atmosphere composed of free electrons and ions.
The study led by Charles Lin of National Cheng Kung University in Tainan, Taiwan, analysed how the launch affected the ionosphere.
The launch created an extremely rare, perfectly circular shock wave, the first such event recorded after a rocket launch.
It was the largest rocket shock wave the team had ever seen.
Researchers said that the hole was caused by ‘rapid chemical reactions of rocket exhaust plumes’ and charged particles in the atmosphere.
The study was published in the journal Space Weather.
