Paper detail

External environmental noise influences on Virgo during O3

Sources of geophysical noise, such as wind, sea waves and earthquakes, can have an impact on gravitational wave interferometers causing sensitivity worsening and gaps in data taking. During the 1-year long O3 run (April 1st 2019 to March 27th 2020), the Virgo Collaboration collected a statistically significant dataset to study the response of the detector to a variety of environmental conditions. We used these data to correlate environmental parameters to global detector performance, such as observation range, duty cycle and control losses. Where possible, we identified weaknesses in the detector and we elaborated strategies to improve Virgo robustness against external disturbances for the next run O4, planned to start in summer 2022. In this article we present preliminary results of this study.