5900km+ opening on 70 MHz from the Canary Islands to Kazakhstan - 25th May 2021

Tuesday 25th May 2021: There was an extensive Sporadic-E opening on the VHF bands with openings all of the way up to 144 MHz. On 70 MHz, there was evidence of plenty of multi-hop Sporadic-E including the one shown above from EA8JF in the Canary Islands to UN3M in Kazakhstan, a distance of 5946kms.

The map above from the PSK Reporter website clearly shows the 3 hop zones. First hop to Spain & Portugal, second hop to the centre of Europe and the one lone triple hop to Kazakhstan.

While double hop Sporadic-E at 70 MHz is rarer than 50 MHz, it is unusual to see triple hop on the band. Sometimes this can be as much to the limited number of countries with access to the band as much as the difficultly of getting three hops at 70 MHz.

These are the reports from the PSK Reporter website for distances over 4000kms.

Txmtr Rcvr Band Mode Distance Time (UTC)

UN3M EA8JF 4m FT8 5946 km 09:49:14

SP2CHY EA8WU 4m FT8 4014 km 11:53:42

YL2CP EA8/DF4UE 4m FT8 4399 km 11:40:44

YL2CA EA8/DF4UE 4m FT8 4208 km 12:24:59

It was interesting to see that EA8/DF4UE managed to hear Latvia as well.

From the Kazakhstan point of view, this is the map for UN3M...

...and for UN7MBH...

These are the combined reports for distances over 4000kms from Kazakhstan...

Txmtr Rcvr Band Mode Distance Time (UTC)

UN3M EA8JF 4m FT8 5946 km 09:49:14

EA4T UN3M 4m FT8 4462 km 10:11:59

EC4TR UN3M 4m FT8 4414 km 10:12:29

UN3M EA3KE 4m FT8 4114 km 09:54:42

EA1YV UN7MBH 4m FT8 4566 km 13:53:56

UN7MBH EA1YV 4m FT8 4566 km 13:46:44

UN7MBH EA1UR 4m FT8 4468 km 07:10:12

UN7MBH EA1AF 4m FT8 4279 km 13:46:14

DX Cluster: Some of  the double hop Sporadic-E spots for 70 MHz from the day are shown below. Note the spot for EA8BPX to ES1II/8, a distance of 4537ms which is close to the maximum for double hop Sporadic-E.

6000 km plus contact made between the Canary Islands & Kazakhstan on 70 MHz - 18th June 2019

I recently came across details of a remarkable 70 MHz contact that was made on the 18th of June 2019 between EA8DBM in the Canary Islands and UN7MBH in Kazakhstan. It's possible that someone hadn't noticed the date on the FT8 screen capture when posted online and thought it was from 2020 instead.

Despite the fact that it's over a year old, it was still an interesting contact as it was in the region of 6,112 kms. As you can see from the screenshot below, the contact was made via the FT8 digital mode.

While most Sporadic-E contacts on 70 MHz might be in the region of say 1500 to 2200 kms, the 6000 km plus distance for this contact suggests that it may have been triple hop Sporadic-E.

Triple hop Sporadic-E on 50 MHz is interesting but not that unusual. After all, most of the 6-metre contacts between Europe and the USA are triple hop or more.

However as the frequency get higher, a higher level of ionisation is required. At 70 MHz, single hop Sporadic-E is very common, double hop is a more unusual but triple hop is more exceptional.

I searched on the net for more information on this remarkable contact but there didn't seem to be anything about it. I thought I'd make a post about it so that at least a record of it now exists.

I know that there have been triple hop contacts from the north-west of Europe to the Arabian Peninsula but I don't think any of those exceed 6000 kms.