Good opening on 28 MHz - Tues 9th Apr 2019

As we approach the middle of April, the level of Sporadic-E level on 28 MHz seems to gradually increasing. This was certainly the case on the 9th of April 2019 when the band was open constantly for about two and a half hours.

These were the conditions for the last two days on 10-metres...

Monday 8th April 2019... A pretty poor day with just four signals heard.

075000 -17 -0.1  737 ~  CQ DX F5UJQ IN94
114115 -20 -0.7 1319 ~  CQ DJ8QX JO31
153045 -15 -0.6 1741 ~  CQ ON8DM JO10
191800 -14 -0.3 1970 ~  PY2JOS EA7DT RR73

The DL0IGI beacon was also heard but didn't last long.
EI7GL 28205.0 DL0IGI/B 12:56 08 Apr IO51TUJN57MT Fed. Rep. of Germany

Tuesday 9th April 2019... This by contrast was much better with a Sporadic-E area somewhere over the Bay of Biscay allowing really good propagation to the south from Ireland and the UK.

Some of the signals heard on FT8



F6FEF 10m FT8 987 km 15:12:32
EI7HDB 10m FT8 152 km 15:00:14
F5OHM 10m FT8 919 km 14:56:29
PA3AGN 10m FT8 927 km 14:29:30
EA4WD 10m FT8 1447 km 13:56:44
CT7AQS 10m FT8 1340 km 13:50:59
CT1ILT 10m FT8 1223 km 13:50:44
CT1IUA 10m FT8 1649 km 13:46:44
CT2FEY 10m FT8 1263 km 13:41:14
EA4ZM 10m FT8 1449 km 13:40:59
CT7AQD 10m FT8 1263 km 13:40:59
ZS6S 10m FT8 9354 km 13:31:29
EA3NW 10m FT8 1410 km 13:30:14
M0SSK 10m FT8 608 km 13:29:29
MW0CRI 10m FT8 254 km 13:28:29
EA5CMW 10m FT8 1486 km 13:22:59
CT1EQQ 10m FT8 1190 km 13:18:44
EA3RT 10m FT8 1399 km 13:09:29
EA1FZ 10m FT8 1133 km 13:05:29
F2YT 10m FT8 776 km 13:03:29
CT7AUP 10m FT8 1432 km 13:02:29
IZ4VSD 10m FT8 1609 km 13:02:14
F5OYM 10m FT8 1462 km 12:56:15
DK9WI 10m FT8 1073 km 12:54:44
EA7JLI 10m FT8 1758 km 12:53:59
IW5EID 10m FT8 1642 km 12:41:29
G0OYQ 10m FT8 579 km 12:32:29
EA6SK 10m FT8 1601 km 12:13:45
EA3AXV 10m FT8 1389 km 11:42:29
EA3CTN 10m FT8 1409 km 11:41:44
EA3EAU 10m FT8 1407 km 11:37:59
IZ0EGA 10m FT8 1930 km 11:27:16
DO1EJK 10m FT8 1118 km 10:08:19

UW5EJX/MM off the coast of Angola was also spotted on FT8 but didn't get uploaded to the PSKReporter website.
EI7GL 28074.0 UW5EJX/MM 13:08 09 Apr IO51TU<>JI61PF FT8 Ukraine

Some of the other signals heard were...
EI7GL 28074.0 AN770DX 13:01 09 Apr IO51TUIM67LG FT8 Spain
EI7GL 28255.8 C30P/B 12:26 09 Apr IO51TUJN02SM Andorra
EI7GL 28251.1 ED4YAK/B 12:00 09 Apr IO51TUIN80FK Spain

Some notes and observations...
1) Duration... The main opening lasted from about 11:30 to 14:00 UTC... about two and a half hours.

2) East-West paths further south... I could see from the FT8 traffic that stations in Spain and Italy were working Indonesia...i.e. East-West paths were possible at lower latitudes (Approx 40 deg N) on 10-metres.

3) Most activity on FT8... Even when the FT8 signals were quite strong, there was hardly any activity down on the CW or SSB portions of the band. I heard two to three European stations calling DX that I couldn't hear.