Flux Rope Model of the 2003 October 28-30 Coronal Mass Ejection and Interplanetary Coronal Mass Ejection

Abstract

A numerical model of an erupting solar flux rope is shown to reproduce both quantitative near-Sun properties of the 2003 October 28 coronal mass ejection and the timing, strength, and orientation of the fields measured in situ at 1 AU. Using a simple erupting flux rope model, we determine the best-fit parameters for this event. Our analysis shows that the orientation of the magnetic axis of the flux rope in this case rotates smoothly through approximately 50° as the flux rope apex expands from the solar surface to 1 AU. Using a global magnetospheric simulation code, we further show that the resulting model solar wind properties at 1 AU produce a magnetospheric response comparable to that computed using the actual solar wind data.