Field-Aligned Currents and Flow Bursts in the Earth’s Magnetotail

Abstract: We use electric and magnetic field data from MMS spacecraft between 2016 and 2017 tostatistically investigate earthward propagating plasma flow bursts and field-aligned currents(FACs) inside the plasma sheet of the geomagnetic tail. We observe that the occurrence rateof flow burst peaks around the midnight region with decreasing trend towards Earth and theplasma sheet flanks. Further, we distinguish between long and short FACs. Long FACs laston average 6 sec and have a magnitude of 5-20 nA/m 2 . Short FACs last on average 10 timesshorter and have an magnitude of 10-50 nA/m 2 . Both, long and short FACs occur on averageone time per flow burst, on minimum 0 times and on maximum 4 times per flow burst. Intotal, 43 % of the observed FACs are located in a flow burst, 40 % before and 17 % right after aflow burst.