3000km opening on Band 2 (88-108 MHz) from Ireland to Western Sahara - 10th Nov 2024

Paul Logan in the north-west of Ireland is one of the most active FM DXers in Europe and on the 10th of Nov 2024, he caught an interesting opening on the 88-108 MHz band.

From about 11:00 to 12:00 UTC, he heard a large number of FM radio stations from Spain and Portugal due to a Sporadic-E opening. While this is quite normal during the summer Sporadic-E season, it is unusual during the month of November and especially at these frequencies.

However, the really interesting signals were those that were much further to the south. This is an extract from Paul's log...

Mode UTC  QRG ITU Station, location Distance km kW ERP Pol
Es 1209 87.90 AZR RTP Antena 2, Pico Alto de Santa Maria 2346 1 v
Es 1151 93.00 CNR COPE, Puerto del Rosario/Temejereque 2906  4
Es 1154 88.60 CNR Happy FM, Puerto del Rosario/Temejereque 2906 0.25
Es 1152 91.20 CNR Onda Fuerteventura, Puerto del Rosario/Temejereque 2906 0.5 m
Es 1149 87.70 CNR RNE Radio Clásica, Puerto del Rosario/Temejereque 2906 7 m
Es 1146 90.20 MRC SNRT Al Idaâ Al-Watania, Tarfaya 2960  4 v
Es 1146 93.90 MRC SNRT Al Idaâ Al-Watania, Laâyoune=El Aaiún 3050 3.16 v
Es 1146 91.00 MRC SNRT Radio Régionale de Laâyoune, Laâyoune=El Aaiún 3050 10 h
Es 1146 87.90 MRC SNRT Al Idaâ Al Amazighia, Laâyoune=El Aaiún 3050 10 h

AZR - Azores, CNR - Canary Islands, MRC - Morocco / Western Sahara

Note that the signals are in the lower portion of the 88-108 MHz band and the highest frequency listed is 93.9 MHz.

For this opening, Paul was using a SDR Play RSP1A receiver with a 9-element Yagi for Band 2.

The normal maximum range of single hop Sporadic-E signals is about 2300 kms so an explanation is required as to how the signals above were heard.

The image above shows the tropo forecast by Pascal, F5LEN showing enhanced conditions to the north of the Azores and Canary Islands.

It seems likely that while there was a Sporadic-E opening from Ireland to Spain and Portugal, this very likely extended to the west as well to the sea to the west of Portugal. This then coupled into a maritime surface tropo duct as far as the Azores, Canary Island and the Western Sahara / Morocco. 

Of course, no-one can say for certain that this is exactly what happened. There is always the possibility of two Sporadic-E hops but the chances of that are a lot lower then the combined Sp-E / Tropo scenario.

Paul Logan as a very active FM DXer has heard stations in this area before but it's usually during the summer Sporadic-E season. It's just very unusual to hear 3000 kms signals in mid-November.

Indeed, Paul reports that this is the first time he has heard the Canary Islands by Sporadic-E outside of the usual summer season.

Links...

1) For latest logs on FM DX, see https://www.fmlist.org/

2) For more examples of long distance reception reports, see my 88-108 MHz page.

TEP openings on the 144 MHz band from St Helena Island to Europe - Oct 2024

Back at the end of September 2024, I had a post on the blog about the first TEP contact on the 144 MHz band between Spain and St Helena in the South Atlantic, a distance of about 6,100 kms - Post HERE.

Just after that, other stations in Spain and Portugal were making TEP contacts with St Helena so I waited for the end of October to do a proper report.

First of all, I must give credit to Gabriel, EA6VQ who collects a list of TEP openings on his website... https://www.dxmaps.com/

As with all data, it's hard to know from just raw information what is going on. So I took the information and generated the map that is shown above to give a better idea of what happened during the month of October 2024.

Some notes...

1) # of Days... Out of the 31 days of October 2024, there were 22 days where Trans-Equatorial Propagation on 144 MHz was reported between St Helena and the Iberian peninsula. As Garry, ZD7GWM is the only person active on 144 MHz from St Helena, any reported activity obviously depends on him being active. 

There were also a few days where TEP didn't seem possible due to geomagnetic disturbances. 

Still though, it's remarkable that there was a TEP path on 144 MHz to St Helena on two-thirds of the days of the month.

2) Mode... The initial contact with EA4I last month was with the FT4 digital mode. They are now using modes more suitable for TEP. For the first half of the month, the Q65-30B mode was used while the Q65-60D mode was used in the second half.

3) Right Angles... At 144 MHz, the TEP paths cross the geomagnetic equator close to 90-degrees. This is where the value of map becomes a reality because we can see the spread east and west of the stations involved.

Most of the stations at the northern end of the TEP circuit are in Portugal and the EA4 & EA7 regions of Spain. It's interesting to see EA3CJ in the NE of Spain is the outlier and well to the east of the rest. 

4) Missing signals?... Sometimes, it's the missing signals that are interesting. There were no reports from the EA1 area in the NW of Spain. Too far north? There were also no reports from the EA5 or EA6 areas. Too far east?

5) Distances... The longest distances are in the region of 6,300 to 6,400 kms. A total of 17 stations were involved at the northern end of the TEP path. Even UT1FG/MM on a ship to the west of the Straits of Gibraltar managed to get in on the action!

CT1EEB IN50qr 6315km

CT7ABA IN60GD 6246km

CT1FCX IM59LG

CT1APE IM59kj

CT1FFU IM59kk

CT1DIZ IM58kp

CT1CAD IM67GE 

UT1FG/MM IM55

EA3CJ JN01SE 6403km

EA4GDA IM68MV

EA4I  IM68MU

EA4LU IM68TV

EA4CYQ IM78CX

EA7/SM0KAK IM76mm

EA7BPO  IM76SR

EA7HLB IM76OP

EA7FDW  IM76WS

6) Times... As is typical with evening type TEP, most of the signals were around 8pm local time. The earliest report was at 19:38 UTC and the last report was 21:32 UTC.

7) ZD7GWM... As far as  I know, Garry, ZD7GWM on St Helena has a modest station with just 50-watts from a Yaesu FT-897 into a Diamond X700H vertical antenna.

Analysis... I've been following the TEP tests in 2024 and it has been pretty remarkable just how often the path is there on 144 MHz. I think a lot of people expected it to be more sporadic but it often seems like TEP at certain times of the year is almost a daily occurrence.

Looking at the map, I think a lot of people will be wondering just how far north could this TEP path reach? Is it possible to reach the north of Spain? Could another propagation mode take the TEP signal further north to the likes of Ireland, Wales & the SW of England?

Sporadic-E would be an obvious answer but it's very unlikely at 144 MHz at 8pm on an evening in October. A maritime duct from Ireland to the north of Spain is more likely but signals don't seem to get too far inland into Spain.

It's very likely that the TEP signals from St Helena are in the north of Morocco but there is no-one there to exploit it.

I have a previous post about Garry's set up HERE

For more information about other long distance openings on the 2m band, see my 144 MHz page.

Opening from Guam to Ireland on the 50 MHz band - 5th Nov 2024

Tuesday 5th Nov 2024 - I had a quick listen to the FT8 frequency of 50.313 MHz today and almost straight away, I got FT8 decodes from India and Sri Lanka. It was obvious that there was some really good F2 propagation on the band.

I checked the PSKReporter website later to see if there were any good DX paths. I was interested to see that there was a path open from KG6DX on the island of Guam in the Pacific to Ireland & the UK.

Sometimes, it's not the distance that matters but how far north or south the path goes.

In this case, did the 50 MHz signals really go direct and pass that far north over Russia? Or was the path skewed with the signals following a path further south?

The solar flux today was 246 with a smoothed sunspot number of 191.

Here are some of the stations that had a path open to Guam (12,000kms +)

 Txmtr Rcvr Band Mode Distance Time (UTC) SNR

CT1EEB KG6DX 6m FT8 13398 km 11:20:13 -15
KG6DX CT1EEB 6m FT8 13398 km 11:18:59 -15
CT7BIZ KG6DX 6m FT8 13360 km 11:25:43 -17
KG6DX EA5K 6m FT8 13311 km 11:18:59 -18
F4BKV KG6DX 6m FT8 12588 km 11:28:13 -18
F8BON KG6DX 6m FT8 12540 km 11:35:43 -15
F8DBF KG6DX 6m FT8 12494 km 11:20:13 -7
KG6DX F6HRP 6m FT8 12429 km 11:18:59 -12
G7RAU KG6DX 6m FT8 12377 km 11:39:43 -13
KG6DX G7RAU 6m FT8 12377 km 11:18:57 -1
G8BCG KG6DX 6m FT8 12309 km 11:35:43 -16
EI7BA KG6DX 6m FT8 12305 km 11:21:13 -16
EI3EBB KG6DX 6m FT8 12290 km 11:23:43 -11
KG6DX GE1SDX 6m FT8 12267 km 11:18:59 -11
KG6DX G0KDY 6m FT8 12260 km 11:18:59 -15
KG6DX G0ABI 6m FT8 12243 km 11:19:29 -7
G0GGG KG6DX 6m FT8 12150 km 11:24:43 -18
GW7SMV KG6DX 6m FT8 12147 km 11:29:13 -10
KG6DX GW7SMV 6m FT8 12147 km 11:19:56 -11
KG6DX G0KTN 6m FT8 12141 km 11:26:00 -9
F6GCP KG6DX 6m FT8 12140 km 11:18:43 -17
G4CCZ KG6DX 6m FT8 12068 km 11:21:13 -16
KG6DX GW0WZL 6m FT8 12052 km 11:18:57 -6
F5OHS KG6DX 6m FT8 12027 km 11:30:43 -16
G0MTN KG6DX 6m FT8 12019 km 11:28:13 -10
KG6DX GW8ASD 6m FT8 12005 km 11:18:56 -10
GW8ASD KG6DX 6m FT8 12005 km 11:17:13 -14

K6JEY talks to Ham Radio Workbench podcast about Earth Moon Earth Amateur Radio Operation

 

Over the last few months. I've been listening to some of the back catalogue of podcasts from the Ham Radio Workbench while I've been out walking. I recently listened to one titled 'Earth Moon Earth Operation'. 

In the podcast. Doug Millar, K6JEY talks to George, KJ6VU and Mike, VA3MW about his experience operating moonbounce on the 144 MHz and microwave amateur radio bands.

While the podcast is from September of 2020, I think a lot of people who are interested in the VHF and microwave bands will find it of interest.

The podcast itself at 2 hours 33 minutes is very long. The first 32 minutes is general chit chat with some microwave operation discussed.

The first part of the presentation proper begins at 32:00 and lasts until about 1:52:00. The photos and notes for this first section are shown in a PDF slideshow titled SIDEWALK EME... Link HERE 

The second part of the presentation starts at 1:52:00 and concludes at about 2:30:00. The second PDF slideshow is titled 10GHz EME Project... Link HERE 

40 MHz option added to popular ON4KST Chat site...

The ON4KST 'CHAT' website is a very popular tool for radio amateurs on the VHF & UHF bands as it allows them to exchange real time information with others about band conditions.

While there are several different platforms for information, each one tends to serve a different function.

The DX-Cluster is good for spotting DX stations on a particular frequency but the exchange of information is very limited.

There is the 40 MHz & 60 MHz group on Facebook with roughly 1200 members but that's more for post-opening analysis and the sharing of images.

The ON4KST pages have their own niche and it allows for the rapid exchange of short live time messages about what's happening on a particular band.

An screenshot of the CHAT site is shown above.

There used to be some 40 MHz traffic before on the 50 MHz chat page but with more people experimenting on the band, Alain ON4KST has kindly set up a separate page for 8m activity.

The link is http://www.on4kst.info/

For more info on the 8m band, see my 40 MHz page.

17,000km+ opening on the 50 MHz band from the UK to Sydney, Australia - 27th Oct 2024

There's an expression in the English language called 'CAN'T SEE THE WOOD FOR THE TREES'. Sometimes DX on the VHF bands can be like this, you can see a flood of reports and contacts on a particular band during an opening but the exceptional DX reports often get missed.

There have been many reports of openings in the last week from Australia to Europe but a lot of these are from the south of Europe and to places like Western Australia (VK6). There's a huge difference between say an opening on 6m from Perth to Athens compared to say an opening from the UK to New South Wales.

Conditions on Sunday the 27th of October 2024 were really good on the 50 MHz band and Stewart, G0LGS in the west of England reports working VK2IR in Sydney, Australia... a distance just under 17,120kms.

Stewart sends on the following report... "After being on six (on/off) since 1985 I was lucky to get one of those magic moments on Six just after 07:00 on Sunday 27th October 2024

I was up early and had the beam looking East for a while on 6m FT8 (50.313) when at 07:07:15 I saw VK2IR calling an OZ station (Denmark).

I immediately stated calling CQ and after 4 calls at 07:09:15 UTC. VK2IR called me giving me -17. Report, my report back was R-17 and at that point the conditions faded a little (I could see faint trace in waterfall but no decodes) and I was not sure if we would complete however at 07:11:45. I finally received RR73 for my first ever 6m contact with VK at 17,089km.

This QSO was later confirmed on LoTW

Paul G4RRA saw things a little better than I did and during that period when VK2IR also worked PA3GCV and then just after that PA0O and PC5C as can be seen from Paul's Screenshot.

I am told that this might be the best distance Terrestrial DX on 6m from the UK so far this season.

On Monday some UK and EU stations managed to make SSB QSOs with VK6 and on Tuesday some had SSB QSO's with DU6/PE1NSQ and FT8 with both DU6/PE1NSQ and 4S7AB and others, but I missed out on those.

Currently (Weds 0820) VK's are getting good propagation to East EU and Scandinavia."

G0LGS was using an ICOM IC-7300 with an Acom 1000 Linear (set to about 700W) with a 4 Ele LFA at 7m above ground level.

Analysis... As we reach the peak of the current sunspot cycle, conditions are really getting good on the 50 MHz band. Unlike previous solar peaks when the dominant modes were SSB and CW, there are now huge numbers of stations using weak signal modes like FT8 which allows reception of very weak signals buried in the noise. It's probably fair to say that openings and contacts are being made now that would have gone unnoticed in the past.

On the 27th of October, the solar flux was at 246 and the sunspot number was 198. The propagation mode was via the F2 layer of the ionosphere.

Over the next few months, we're likely to see more remarkable paths appearing on the 50 MHz band and now is the time to be active on the band. If the 6m band can open from the NW of Europe to the SE of Australia then there should be plenty of more opportunities.

Link... See my 50 MHz page for more reports of other long distance openings on the 6m band.