Monday, February 7, 2011

Can We Really Predict Radio Propagation ?

Strange Propagation ?


I guess by now, we all know as Amateur Radio Operators ... 
Solar Weather and Radio Propagation
 is very hard to predict.


Below is this past weekends observation & forecast :

Space Weather Message Code: WARK05
Serial Number: 676
Issue Time: 2011 Feb 05 0020 UTC
EXTENDED WARNING: Geomagnetic K-index of 5 expected
Extension to Serial Number: 675
Valid From: 2011 Feb 04 1930 UTC
Now Valid Until: 2011 Feb 04 0330 UTC
Warning Condition: Onset
 & 
SolarCycle24.org ......
On Friday February 4, 2011 recurrent trans-equatorial coronal hole #436(#433) was in geo-effective (Earth facing) position and impacted Earth's magnetic field in a negative manner, producing a Kp of 6 (moderate geomagnetic storming conditions).

The end result was a reduction in the F2 layer maximum usable frequency (MUF) that negatively effected propagation conditions on 10, 12 and 15 meters.
.........
Notice the predicted END RESULT on 10-12 & 15 ?

I'm certainly no expert on Solar Weather ...
But I have noticed over the years 
that at the onset of high solar activity
we sometimes tend to have enhanced HF conditions
 on the Ham Bands for a day or so!!
This past weekend was no exception !!!
Over the weekend I worked 21 new band countries on 7 different bands

Below is my list from this weekend :

10 Meters 
TR8 - Gabon
VP8 - South Orkney

12 Meters 
J79 - Dominica
TJ3 - Cameroon
TR8 - Gabon
HP1 - Panama
LU7 - Argentina
VP8 - S. Orkney
KH2 - Guam

17 Meters
PJ4 - Bonaire
VP2 - Montserrat

20 Meters
PJ4 - Bonaire

30 Meters
PJ2 - Curacao
VP8 - S. Orkney
XT - Burkina Faso
S9 - Sao Tome
A4 - Oman
C6 - Bahamas
A3 - Tonga

40 Meters
TJ3 - Cameroon

160 Meters
VP8 - S. Orkney

All I can say is .... What a fun weekend on the Radio !!
Notice that's new band countries 
all the way from 10 meters to 160 meters ... Wow !!
I'm just wondering if anyone else noticed these Enhanced conditions
 this past weekend ?

73 de N4LA
Get
 RADIO-ACTIVE !!






3 comments:

PE4BAS, Bas said...

Congrats Todd, really great. I've been on 20m Sunday afternoon in the XE RTTY contest, unfortenately very bad propagation. Although I worked some USA, but with very low signals. I did work some Europeans also with low signals, and the band was closed at 16:00 UTC here. Didn't check low bands however. 73, Bas

Paul Stam PAØK said...

Nice list of DXCC, No qrp I presume? ;-) 73 Paul

John AE5X said...

Congrats, esp on VP8ORK on 160!