Comparison of observed hmF2 and IRI 2007 model with M(3000)F2 estimation of hmF2 at low solar activity for an equatorial station Original Research Article

This is to investigate ways of improving the Equatorial F2-layer peak heights estimated from M(3000)F2 ionosonde data measured using the Ionospheric Prediction Service (IPS-42) sounder at Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (Latitude +12.4°N, Longitude +1.5°W, Dip latitude +5.9°N) during a low solar activity year (1995). For this purpose, we have compared the observed hmF2 (hmF2obs) deduced using an algorithm from scaled virtual heights of quiet day ionograms and the predicted hmF2 values which is given by the IRI 2007 model (hmF2IRI 2007) with the ionosonde measured M(3000)F2 estimation of the hmF2 values (hmF2est) respectively. The correlation coefficients R2 for all the seasons were found to range from 0.259 to 0.692 for hmF2obs values, while it ranges from 0.551 to 0.875 for the hmF2IRI 2007 values. During the nighttime, estimated hmF2 (hmF2est) was found to be positively correlated with the hmF2obs values by the post-sunset peak representation which is also represented by the hmF2IRI 2007 values. We also investigated the validity of the hmF2est values by finding the percentage deviations when compared with the hmF2obs and hmF2IRI 2007.