06-05-2014: Coincidences - showers detected by multiple stations

By: Arne de Laat

One of the reasons many schools participate in the HiSPARC experiment is that you can do more together than alone. When multiple stations detect different parts of the same extensive air shower we can derive more information than when only one stations detects it.

 

Using the GPS timestamps, which are recorded with each detection, we can derive which events from different stations occured at the same time, i.e. within 2 µs = 0.000002 seconden. When multiple stations measured something within that short time window we call it a coincidence. When a cosmic ray has more energy its air shower will leave a larger footprint on the ground, increasing the change that multiple stations will detect it.

 

On the new page Coincidences we show the number of coincidences per hour and how often coincidences between a certain number of stations occured. There is also a Coincidences Download Form to download the events in these coincidences.