There was another remarkable opening on Band 2 across the North Atlantic on the 1st of July when Bryce Foster, K4NBF near Cape Cod in Massachusetts in the USA heard RTP Antena 3 on the Azores Islands on 87.7 MHz.
The distance was in the region of 3,830kms and it is I believe the very first reception report of a Band 2 signal from the Azores in the USA.
From what I understand, the reception happened at 14:15 UTC and it lasted for about 35-minutes.
The FM radio transmitter had a power of 30 kW and was located at the Pico da Barrosa site which is about 900m above sea level on the island of Sao Miguel in the Azores.
Propagation Mode: The map below shows the predicted tropo conditions on the North Atlantic path...
It would seem that the most likely propagation mode was double-hop Sporadic-E with perhaps TWO x 1900km hops.
Around the same time as this trans-Atlantic opening, Larry Horlick, VO1FOG in Newfoundland heard a Band 2 FM radio station in Bermuda. This would suggest that there was an active Sporadic-E region in the western part of the N Atlantic capable of supporting propagation on Band 2.
The tropo map above shows a bit of tropo to the west of the Azores but I don't think it's enough to account for the additional 1500kms that is required to be added on to one Sp-E hop of 2300kms.
In Conclusion: Back on the 21st of June 2021, there was a remarkable trans-Atlantic opening on the 88-108 MHz band between Europe and Canada. See links to posts on this page.
Now just over a week later, we have another opening across the North Atlantic and the first reception report from the USA of the Azores.
I suspect this more southern path opens on Band 2 a lot more than we suspect and it will hopefully encourage more people the NE of the USA to listen for trans-Atlantic signals.
2 comments:
Excellent stuff. Have to keep in mind the power of those FM transmitters, but then weak signal modes make up for that, at least in part.
The key to this is more people trying. There are far, far too few. Sure, there are dedicated people who sit there, day in, day out. They might get lucky, but it would be better for the development of our understanding if more people, in more places, were active.
There were definitely fairly localised Es clouds around inthe Atlantic yesterday; 12m opened and closed intermittently to the US from Wales, as did 6m - a sure sign.
its all about turning your antenna and leaving it while there is openings going on off the back of it and static to where you are beaming and alot of dxers wont do this or give some feeble excuse like there is a hill in the way , when i received Canada back in 2003 there was a massive opening going on to the east and i had to sit on my hands and leave the rotator alone.
Going on to distances , Paul and Mike southern uk regularly receive multi hop from southern Turkey etc at the same type of distance/farther than Canada and a much less favourable path and nothing much is said about that as they do it every year
dxers in the uk need to take the fuse out of the rotator and give it to wife partner or whatever and not to give it back untill next day if the props are looking good for TA
i have given up on b2 dx due lack of openings here in Scotland and got bored with it and went back to Ham radio , 73 David
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