Cosmic ray
Cosmic ray flux depends on altitude. For the common reference location of 40.7° N, 74° W at sea level (New York City, NY, USA) the flux is approximately 14 neutrons/cm2/hour. Burying a system in a cave reduces the rate of cosmic-ray induced soft errors to a negligible level. In the lower levels of the atmosphere, the flux increases by a factor of about 2.2 for every 1000 m (1.3 for every 1000 ft) increase in altitude above sea level. Computers operated on top of mountains experience an order of magnitude higher rate of soft errors compared to sea level. The rate of upsets in aircraft may be more than 300 times the sea level upset rate. This is in contrast to package decay induced soft errors, which do not change with location.