Effects observed in the ionospheric F region in the east Asian sector during the intense geomagnetic disturbances in the early part of November 2004

The Sun was very active in the early part of November 2004. During the period of 8–10 November 2004, intense geomagnetic disturbances with two superstorms were observed. In a companion paper (hereinafter referred to as paper 1), the effects observed in the F region during the intense geomagnetic disturbances in the early part of November 2004 in the Latin American sector were presented. In the present paper, we investigate the effects observed in the F region during the intense geomagnetic disturbances in the early part of November 2004 in the east Asian sector. We have used the ionospheric sounding observations at Ho Chi Minh City (Vietnam) and Okinawa, Yamagawa, Kokubunji, and Wakkanai (Japan) in the present investigations. Also, GPS observations in the east Asian sector (several longitude zones) have been used to study the effect in the F region during the intense geomagnetic disturbances. The ion density versus latitudinal variations obtained by the DMSP F15 satellite orbiting at about 800 km altitude in the east Asian sector and the magnetic field data obtained at several stations in the Japanese meridian are also presented. Several important features from these observations in both the sectors during this extended period of intense geomagnetic disturbances are presented. The east Asian sector showed very pronounced effects during the second superstorm, which was preceded by two storm enhancements. It should be mentioned that around the beginning of the night on 10 November, ionospheric irregularities propagating from higher midlatitude region to low‐latitude region were observed in the Japanese sector. The most intense geomagnetic field H component in that sector was observed on 10 November at L = 2.8, indicating that the auroral oval and the heating got further to low latitudes and the ionospheric irregularities observed in the Japanese sector on this night are midlatitude ionospheric disturbances associated with the second superstorm. The absence of ionospheric irregularities in the Japanese sector during the 8 November superstorm suggests that the magnetosphere‐ionosphere system was possibly preconditioned (primed) when the second interplanetary structure impacted the magnetosphere.