Thursday, April 30, 2020

Big opening on 28 MHz - Wed 29th Apr 2020


Wednesday 29th April 2020. As the map shows above, there was an extensive Sporadic-E opening on 28 MHz with 689 stations from 46 countries being heard on the band.

The unusual one was the short opening to North America. More later.

First off, here is the map for Europe...





Some points...

a) The Red line shows my one-hop Sporadic-E limit. Everything beyond that is likely to double-hop.

b) What was unusual today was that there was a really good opening to Scandinavia. I heard beacons in Finland for the first time this year.

Beacons... In line with the good conditions, I heard 21 beacons on the band.

EI7GL  SB7W/B 28211.2  IO51TUJO66IA 45w Omni 2006z 29 Apr
EI7GL  F5SN/B 28222  IO51TUJN27RB 1908z 29 Apr
EI7GL  SK7GH/B 28298  IO51TUJO77BF 1848z 29 Apr
EI7GL  LA5TEN/B 28237.4  IO51TUJO59JP 1815z 29 Apr
EI7GL  OH2B/B 28200  IO51TUKP20JE 1646z 29 Apr
EI7GL  OH5TEN/B 28228  IO51TUKP30HV 1641z 29 Apr
EI7GL  ZS6WAB/B 28204.8  IO51TU<>KG46RB 1527z 29 Apr
EI7GL  SK0CT/B 28292.2  IO51TUJO89XK 1231z 29 Apr
EI7GL  OZ7IGY/B 28271  IO51TUJO55WM 1230z 29 Apr
EI7GL  DM0AAB/B 28277.3  IO51TUJO54GH 1228z 29 Apr
EI7GL  DB0UM/B 28279  IO51TUJO73CE 1227z 29 Apr
EI7GL  DB0TEN/B 28245.2  IO51TUJO42UV 1224z 29 Apr
EI7GL  DB0FKS/B 28210.7  IO51TUJN49IT 1222z 29 Apr
EI7GL  ED4YAK/B 28251.4  IO51TUIN80FK 1118z 29 Apr
EI7GL  DB0UM/B 28279  IO51TUJO73CE 1117z 29 Apr
EI7GL  I3GNQ/B 28321.7  IO51TUJN55VJ 1116z 29 Apr
EI7GL  DK0TEN/B 28257.8  IO51TUJN47NT 1108z 29 Apr
EI7GL  ON0RY/B 28207.1  IO51TUJO20CK 1106z 29 Apr
EI7GL  IW3FZQ/B 28227.2  IO51TUJN55VF 1038z 29 Apr
EI7GL  OE3XAC/B 28188  IO51TUJN78SB 1015z 29 Apr
EI7GL  DL0IGI/B 28205  IO51TUJN57MT 1011z 29 Apr

SB7W/B in the south of Sweden was someone running a private beacon.

ZS6WAB/B from South Africa was in again.

OH2B/B in Finland is part of the International Beacon Project on 28.200 MHz. Not the easiest one to catch as it only transmits for about 10 seconds every 3 minutes.

OH5TEN/B in KP30 in Finland is really at the limit of my single hop Sporadic-E limit and may well have been double hop. It's impossible to tell.

ON0RY/B at about 1,000 kms is short skip and a sign of a high MUF.

7 German beacons were heard. DB0FKS/B is always the hardest to hear with it's one-watt to a DV27 loaded whip antenna.

Opening to North America. North-South openings are pretty much the norm on 10 metres, it's the East-West ones that are unusual.


The map above shows those who heard or were heard by WB2WMF in New York state.

It's very likely the mode of propagation was multi-hop Sporadic-E. The 3rd hop landed to the west of the UK with MW0ZZK in Wales and myself hearing the US station. Then there is nicely defined skip zone again as the 4th hop lands further east.

What was probably more unusual was the fact there was only one US station heard. Sometime on 10 metres, it all about being in the right location for the propagation.

As we move into the Summer Sporadic-E season, there will be a lot more multi-hop openings like this and the MUF extending up to the 50 MHz band as well.

These are the FT8 stations heard on 28 MHz that were over 2,400 kms distant

LU5VV 10m FT8 11990 km 18:04:14
PY5HSD 10m FT8 9473 km 16:53:59
ZS6GC 10m FT8 9453 km 15:15:14
PY5DD 10m FT8 9376 km 19:28:59
PU2RDB 10m FT8 9204 km 19:19:59
PY2EPL 10m FT8 9183 km 19:28:44
PY2TC 10m FT8 8959 km 17:42:59
PU9OJZ 10m FT8 8787 km 20:16:14
HC1DAZ 10m FT8 8666 km 22:46:29
PT2AP 10m FT8 8462 km 18:18:00
ZD7JC 10m FT8 7542 km 18:36:45
9Y4VF 10m FT8 6598 km 16:36:44
9K2HS 10m FT8 5211 km 10:22:14
WB2WMF 10m FT8 5067 km 15:11:29
RX9WN 10m FT8 4134 km 14:11:30
UA6XES 10m FT8 3923 km 10:56:44
UA4HAD 10m FT8 3889 km 12:09:44
RY7G 10m FT8 3840 km 18:38:29
UA6FZ 10m FT8 3839 km 10:52:14
R4CX 10m FT8 3757 km 08:49:29
RA6HMS 10m FT8 3676 km 10:18:20
R6AK 10m FT8 3656 km 10:56:45
R6AC 10m FT8 3655 km 11:32:59
RY6AAG 10m FT8 3639 km 09:56:44
UA6YW 10m FT8 3605 km 11:28:15
RK4FD 10m FT8 3555 km 14:11:59
RK6AH 10m FT8 3539 km 09:58:29
R7DA 10m FT8 3505 km 09:58:59
RG7M 10m FT8 3423 km 10:07:29
RZ6BS 10m FT8 3377 km 10:23:15
RA3RGQ 10m FT8 3351 km 10:19:29
RA3OR 10m FT8 3275 km 11:31:44
R6KF 10m FT8 3263 km 09:51:29
RA3SI 10m FT8 3241 km 09:51:59
UX7QV 10m FT8 3199 km 10:23:29
RA7KW 10m FT8 3179 km 10:17:30
R7RZ 10m FT8 3168 km 10:27:45
R7KEO 10m FT8 3136 km 10:04:00
R7KDU 10m FT8 3136 km 10:03:59
UR4QGZ 10m FT8 3112 km 10:17:15
R5DT 10m FT8 3106 km 12:15:15
SV1PMR 10m FT8 2923 km 16:46:59
US5CCO 10m FT8 2826 km 10:20:30
RK1N 10m FT8 2762 km 16:00:44
YO9HP 10m FT8 2628 km 11:00:30
UT4XU 10m FT8 2558 km 10:54:15
EU7FBB 10m FT8 2513 km 20:14:59
EW6X 10m FT8 2445 km 15:39:14

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