Dependence of solar proton events on X-ray flare peak flux, longitude, and impulsive time

In this study, we present a new empirical forecasting method of solar proton events based on flare parameters. For this we used NOAA solar energetic particle (SEP) events from 1976 to 2006 and their associated X-ray flare data. As a result, we found that about only 3.5% (1.9% for M-class and 21.3% for X-class) of the flares are associated with the proton events. It is also found that this fraction strongly depends on longitude; for example, the fraction for $30W^{\circ}$ < L < $90W^{\circ}$ is about three times larger than that for $30^{\circ}E$ < L < $90^{\circ}E$. The occurrence probability of solar proton events for flares with long duration (> 0.3 hours) is about 2 (X-class flare) to 7 (M-class flare) times larger than that for flares with short duration (< 0.3 hours). The relationship between X-ray flare peak flux and proton peak flux as well as its correlation coefficient are strongly dependent on longitude. Using these results for prediction of proton flux, we divided the data into 6 subgroups depending on two parameters: (1) 3 longitude ranges (east, center, and west) and (2) flare impulsive times (long and short). For each subgroup, we make a linear regression between the X-ray flare peak flux and the corresponding proton peak flux. The result shows that the proton flux in the eastern region is much better correlated with the X-ray flux than that in the western region.