This is one of the VHF contacts that caught my attention during the summer last year.
On the 2nd of July 2020, HZ1SK in Saudi Arabia and K4MOG in the USA completed a successful FT8 contact on 50 MHz.
What was unusual about this contact was the fact that it was in the region of 11,460 kms. To put that into context, that is the equivalent of London to Hawaii or London to the NW of Australia.
The propagation mode was probably multi-hop Sporadic-E with at least six hops being required. While single hop or double hop Sporadic-E is reasonably common, the chances of getting six Sp-E clouds in the right spot and the correct distance apart is much lower.
The very first 6m contact between the USA and Saudi Arabia took place just a few weeks earlier when K1TOL in the state of Maine in the NE of the USA worked 7Z1SJ. The distance on that occasion was around 9933 kms which may have been five hop Sporadic-E.
