Sunday, October 3, 2021

Opening to Texas on 28 MHz - Sat 2nd Oct 2021


Saturday 2nd October 2021: It looks like the 28 MHz band is on a bit of a roll at the moment with plenty of DX signals coming in from across the world every day. No two days are the same and the defining feature is how good the East-West propagation is.

On the 2nd, there was a very good F2 opening to the East but the multi-hop to SE Asia wasn't as good as the previous day. On the other hand, there was a good opening to the USA.

From my location in Ireland on the NW of Europe, the first and best F2 openings on 28 MHz are usually to the SE of the USA as this is the most southerly path. This turned out to be the case on the 2nd with a lot of stations from Florida making it through.

The most unusual signals were from Texas which required a more northerly path. This was another first for this season as these are the first signals that I have heard from the Lone Star state.

The Solar Flux on the 2nd was 87 and dropping. A total of 243 stations were heard on FT8 including 12 alone from South Africa.

The CQ WW SSB contest is coming up at the end of the month and I suspect all of the HF bands will be in great shape for it.

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