Properties of Ground Level Enhancement Events and the Associated Solar Eruptions During Solar Cycle 23

Solar cycle 23 witnessed the most complete set of observations of coronal mass ejections (CMEs) associated with the Ground Level Enhancement (GLE) events. We present an overview of the observed properties of the GLEs and those of the two associated phenomena, viz., flares and CMEs, both being potential sources of particle acceleration. Although we do not find a striking correlation between the GLE intensity and the parameters of flares and CMEs, the solar eruptions are very intense involving X-class flares and extreme CME speeds (average ～2000?km/s). An M7.1 flare and a 1200?km/s CME are the weakest events in the list of 16 GLE events. Most (80?%) of the CMEs are full halos with the three non-halos having widths in the range 167 to 212?degrees. The active regions in which the GLE events originate are generally large: 1290?msh (median 1010?msh) compared to 934?msh (median: 790?msh) for SEP-producing active regions. For accurate estimation of the CME height at the time of metric type?II onset and GLE particle release, we estimated the initial acceleration of the CMEs using flare and CME observations. The initial acceleration of GLE-associated CMEs is much larger (by a factor of 2) than that of ordinary CMEs (2.3?km/s² vs. 1?km/s²). We confirmed the initial acceleration for two events for which CME measurements are available in the inner corona. The GLE particle release is delayed with respect to the onset of all electromagnetic signatures of the eruptions: type?II bursts, low frequency type?III bursts, soft X-ray flares and CMEs. The presence of metric type?II radio bursts some 17?min (median: 16?min; range: 3 to 48?min) before the GLE onset indicates shock formation well before the particle release. The release of GLE particles occurs when the CMEs reach an average height of ～3.09?R _s (median: 3.18?R _s ; range: 1.71 to 4.01?R _s ) for well-connected events (source longitude in the range W20–W90). For poorly connected events, the average CME height at GLE particle release is ～66?% larger (mean: 5.18?R _s ; median: 4.61?R _s ; range: 2.75–8.49?R _s ). The longitudinal dependence is consistent with shock accelerations because the shocks from poorly connected events need to expand more to cross the field lines connecting to an Earth observer. On the other hand, the CME height at metric type?II burst onset has no longitudinal dependence because electromagnetic signals do not require magnetic connectivity to the observer. For several events, the GLE particle release is very close to the time of first appearance of the CME in the coronagraphic field of view, so we independently confirmed the CME height at particle release. The CME height at metric type?II burst onset is in the narrow range 1.29 to 1.8?R _s , with mean and median values of 1.53 and 1.47?R _s . The CME heights at metric type?II burst onset and GLE particle release correspond to the minimum and maximum in the Alfvén speed profile. The increase in CME speed between these two heights suggests an increase in Alfvénic Mach number from?2 to?3. The CME heights at GLE particle release are in good agreement with those obtained from the velocity dispersion analysis (Reames in Astrophys. J. 693:812, 2009a; Astrophys. J. 706:844, 2009b) including the source longitude dependence. We also discuss the implications of the delay of GLE particle release with respect to complex type?III bursts by ～18?min (median: 16?in; range: 2 to 44?min) for the flare acceleration mechanism. A?similar analysis is also performed on the delay of particle release relative to the hard X-ray emission.