Saturday, September 24, 2011

Very weird

propagation on the bands today.  I didn't hear anyone who posted on QRPSPOTS today, with the exception of Cam N6GA who got on 15 Meters early and was calling CQ as K6JSS/6.  He was very light into NJ, only about a 529/429 or so.

However, 17 Meters seemed pretty active and I was able to work RT5A Yuri in Russia and S59AA Franc in Slovenia.  20 Meters was dead to me. (Is that melodramatic or what?)  There were a lot of SOTA spots mentioned on QRPSPOTS and I didn't hear any of them.  If I hadn't worked the two DX stations on 17 Meters I probably would have gone out back to make sure the antennas were still up.

Rem K6BBQ mentioned on QRPSPOTS something about an X Class flare.  I guess I wasn't alone in listening to the "sounds of silence".

72 de Larry w2lj
QRP - When you care to send the very least!

4 comments:

  1. Anonymous8:13 PM

    It's funny Larry the numbers have been very good the last week or so but the bands have sounded "dead" to so-so this a way... I also read something about a flare today but actually had a fairly good DX day at this QTH.

    In the hour that I operated this afternoon I worked OK6DJ my rpt 57, S59N my rpt 57, RA6ALS my rpt 59, ON7TZ my rpt 57 and F1UJS my rpt 56 all QSO's 5 Watts SSB. Hot bands here were 15M, 12M Like you I found 20 "dead"

    I don't know what it is about this cycle but the numbers really so far haven't really been much of a factor in making contacts or not...

    73/72,
    Jim WA2OQJ

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  2. Maybe they were all off at the RTTY contest, hi! Last night I took a peak at a WebSDR site and wonder what the heck were all those traces in the lower end of 40 meters! Then ... I listened and I remembered.

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  3. Casey,

    That was part of the problem. It was CQ WW RTTY weekend and I was expecting to hear RTTY stations all the way down to 14.050 or so. I wasn't hearing any of them, either - even way up where'd you'd normally expect to hear RTTY stations. I must live in an RF Black Hole.

    Larry W2LJ

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  4. Hi Larry, indeed I did hear nothing either last night on 20 and 30 meter. But 17 meter was open... 73 Paul

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