Current Moments at ELF of Lightning Discharges Associated with a Mature Tropical Hurricane

Abstract

The mean spectrum of negative polarity slow tail ELF atmospherics received during daytime from the area of a distant mature tropical storm (Hurricane Blanca, August 1966) is presented. The mean amplitude spectrum is used with established attenuation rates to calculate from zero-order mode theory the mean current moment associated with the waveform sources. It is suggested that the waveforms may be greatly controlled by intracloud lightning discharges associated with the degree of vertical development of the hurricane.