Today's transatlantic 50-MHz opening

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Ethan Miller K8GU

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May 19, 2021, 11:31:26 AM5/19/21
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HamSCI,

You never know who you will run into on 6m CW...Chris, G4IFX, and I had a brief 559/559 QSO today!  Thanks!  Had Audacity cooperated, I'd have a recording, too.

I was running 500W to 5 elements at ~10m above ground.  The band was already open when I woke up the computer just before 0600 local here in EM79.

73,

--Ethan, K8GU.

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Carl Luetzelschwab

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May 19, 2021, 12:18:06 PM5/19/21
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Ethan,

G3YLA's sporadic-E prediction website (http://propquest.co.uk/map.php) suggests your QSO was a possibility.

Carl K9LA

Chris Deacon

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May 19, 2021, 1:09:30 PM5/19/21
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Great to work you, Ethan!

 

That was a rare excursion onto CW for me. I really must do it more often, it’s too easy (and effective) just to stay on digital.

 

73

Chris

G4IFX

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Ethan Miller K8GU

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May 19, 2021, 1:36:32 PM5/19/21
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Chris,

It was a real treat...I must admit that I did not recognize your call until after the QSO! 

Yes, FT8 has been a game-changer on 50 MHz for sure.  I squandered several days CQing dead air on CW last summer after I got this antenna up before breaking down and running WSJT!  Today, I noticed that the FT8 bogo-SNR values were hitting around 0 dB today and thought it prudent to go to CW.

Here's to many more transatlantic (and perhaps some transpacific) QSOs this summer!

73,

--Ethan, K8GU.


Ethan Miller K8GU

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May 19, 2021, 1:38:44 PM5/19/21
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Carl,

Thanks for sharing that!  It was a killer opening.  I have to transmit through "Mount Kettering" toward EU, so I don't always get the openings that my neighbors do.

73,

--Ethan, K8GU.


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Joe Dzekevich

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May 19, 2021, 2:09:44 PM5/19/21
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This opening mostly flew over New England.  I saw many 8's, 9's and some 0's working Europe, but I only heard one F, one DL and one SP.  I did work a VO2 North of me.  On FT8 I gave him a +24 and he gave me something like a +05 or so.  He was in there for hours.  Nice to work a station in zone 2.  Joe, K1YOW

Joe Dzekevich

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May 19, 2021, 4:50:36 PM5/19/21
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I take it back....from 3 PM EDT the band shifted and 6m is still wide open to Europe from the Eastern USA.  Worked 10 EU stations before I pulled the plug.

Joe, K1YOW

 


David G. McGaw

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May 20, 2021, 7:59:14 AM5/20/21
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I heard anomalous propagation on FM broadcast yesterday morning and suspected something was up.  And here I am at Wallops and away from my radio.  :-(

David N1HAC
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Joe Dzekevich

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May 20, 2021, 8:03:30 AM5/20/21
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David,

 

The band is still open this morning (5/20/21) to my surprise with QSB.  I got into the Azores and Portugal and almost Ireland.  Yesterday afternoon and evening, 6m was very hot from the East USA coast to Europe.

 

Joe, K1YOW

 


From: ham...@googlegroups.com [mailto:ham...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of David G. McGaw
Sent: Thursday, May 20, 2021 7:59 AM
To: ham...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [HamSCI] Today's transatlantic 50-MHz opening

 

I heard anomalous propagation on FM broadcast yesterday morning and suspected something was up.  And here I am at Wallops and away from my radio.  :-(

David N1HAC

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WILLIAM n SUSIE ENGELKE

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May 20, 2021, 9:34:24 AM5/20/21
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6M now open to eastern Europe, copying Slovenia, Slovakia, etc.  -73- AB4EJ

On Thursday, May 20, 2021, 7:03:33 AM CDT, Joe Dzekevich <joedze...@charter.net> wrote:


David,

 

The band is still open this morning (5/20/21) to my surprise with QSB.  I got into the Azores and Portugal and almost Ireland .  Yesterday afternoon and evening, 6m was very hot from the East USA coast to Europe .

Terry Bullett

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May 20, 2021, 11:17:23 AM5/20/21
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David,

Wallops has a ham club.   W4WFF.
Look up Bryan Sams N0BES

73,

Terry
W0ASP
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Joe Dzekevich

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May 22, 2021, 7:44:52 AM5/22/21
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On Friday (May 21 2021) that long Pacific path was open on 6m.  I was not on, but the folks in the south central US were working Japan on FT8.  I have seen that Pacific path before and I am totally clueless as what is really happening.  I ended-up with something like 20 European FT8 contacts over several days plus the Canary Islands just off of Africa.  There was a big storm system West of Ireland that moved east and another very unsettled area and ridge mid Atlantic plus strong Es over land in the US and EU that allowed the US-EU contacts, but on that south central USA to Japan path – it beats me.  The US at the time for that US-JA path was solid red on DX Maps, so whatever the US-JA path is, it had a good launch point.

 

Joe, K1YOW

Jim Bacon

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May 22, 2021, 8:16:11 AM5/22/21
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Hi Joe,

Interesting to hear of the Pacific paths, on a similar note I was very pleased with the transAtlantic paths on the 19th May from here and managed to work 2 Ws and a VE on 6m CW using 80m doublet… not a big station, hi.

These did appear to correlate well with the jet stream orientation across the Atlantic and, as you said about the other paths recently, tied in with the the big storm systems on the synoptic charts. I have had a quick look at the Es Probability Index (EPI) plot for the Pacific for 23z on the 21st May (the charts overwrite, so cannot go back beyond then) You will note from the EPI plot that there were several ideally spaced maxima across the Pacific to provide a possibility for the path. The orange/red colour scale picks out the maxima in the jet stream cores and are probably identifying the most likely steps along the path to find an Es patch. I don’t not have the surface synoptic weather chart, but would expect to find a low pressure area  over the western States and another in mid Pacific and perhaps (off the left edge of the image) another surface low nearer Japan.

Thanks for flagging this event Joe, I must confess to not checking the Pacific region regularly, so its now on the list!

73 de Jim
g3yla



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Joe Dzekevich

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May 22, 2021, 9:02:13 AM5/22/21
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Thanks Jim for the information.  Interesting on the Pacific plots.  We may have some transatlantic paths today (Sat May 22 2021).  We have a tropical storm burning out in the Atlantic off of the east USA coast and a very big storm in the North Atlantic, but the big storm is a tad further North than I would like to see it for a good US-EU path.  If the tropical storm holds in there and the big North Atlantic storm goes to the SW, then we may get some US-EU paths along with the seasonable Es over both continents.  I really like DX MAPS for seeing what is going on for 6m.  That is where I picked-up on the Pacific path.  Below is the wind look on Sat May 22 2021 12:45 UTC.

 

Joe, K1YOW

 

 


From: ham...@googlegroups.com [mailto:ham...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Jim Bacon
Sent: Saturday, May 22, 2021 8:16 AM
To: 'Steve Nichols' via HamSCI
Subject: Re: [HamSCI] Today's transatlantic 50-MHz opening

 

Hi Joe,

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/hamsci/AM6PR03MB4151043AA8E966A36BA7B656B2289%40AM6PR03MB4151.eurprd03.prod.outlook.com.
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Khan Tran

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May 22, 2021, 9:13:00 AM5/22/21
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I’m right on the Pacific coast at Olympic National Park but just finished packing up camp to head east. Maybe later I can find a spot to setup and listen. 

Ethan Miller K8GU

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May 22, 2021, 9:28:30 AM5/22/21
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Joe and Jim,

I'm enjoying you two weighing in on this!  (And thanks to Carl for pointing us at the EPI maps again.)

In my (limited) experience, there are two sets of transpacific paths that are common on 6m from the U.S.:

1. The "polar path" aka "SSSP - summer solstice 6-meter propagation" (I think I got that right) which connects the US into the Far East, especially Japan.  Those of us in the eastern US only get this a few (1-3) days per year at most, within about a week of the solstice.

2. The equatorial path to ZL/VK, which usually happens around the winter solstice, but I believe it also can happen around the equinox (I think WZ8D near me worked a ZL in March).  This would be likely be Es at each end coupled to a chordal hop F2 across the equatorial anomalies, I believe.  Carl, K9LA, has a paper in one of the ARRL Antenna Compendiums that describes this path on 10 meters.  It happens about once a year or so on 6m, I believe. 

Jim, K6MIO (who I think is on the list), and Bob, K6QXY, wrote a paper or two about SSSP and multi-hop Es, I believe.  I think the name is due to JE1BMJ?  That should give you some pointers to go read more.  That polar SSSP path is fascinating to me; I've long wondered if it has to do with polar mesospheric summer echoes (PMSE) that we observe with the ionospheric radars at high latitudes.  But, I have not dug into it.

We had double-hop to the West Coast here in Ohio last night late, around 10 pm LT.  I picked up K7XC in NV for a new state from this QTH (I've been on the band for less than a year from this QTH, so everything in WAS and VUCC is new again).  I had a few incomplete tries with several stations in OR as well.

73,

--Ethan, K8GU.

Joe Dzekevich

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May 22, 2021, 9:29:26 AM5/22/21
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Khan,

 

I usually do not watch the West USA Pacific areas since I am in New England on the East USA coast.  But, looking at the Pacific on May 22 2021 13:20 UTC, there are three areas lined-up nicely for possible weather assisted Es:  a storm off of California, a big storm at the Aleutians, and a strong ridge line East of Japan.

 

Joe, K1YOW

 

 


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Phil Erickson

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May 22, 2021, 10:00:15 AM5/22/21
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Hi all,

  For convenience, here's Jim Kennedy's article set (from the last solar cycle) on SSSP and multi-hop Es:


  A lot to unpack in there.

  As I write this at 1340 UTC, DXMAPS' "MUF Sp-E" map shows an estimated MUF of 92 MHz max in Europe, which is lit up with 6 meter contacts.  Right in line with Jim's PropQuest blog for today:


  Perhaps time to spin the knob today and get on FT8 (the lingua franca now for 6 meters, for good or ill).
  
73
Phil W1PJE

PS:  Ethan mentions PMSE - polar mesospheric summer echoes.  PMSE has been studied beginning in the late 1980s/early 1990s onwards and is thought to be related to very bright/coherent scattering by ice crystals which form around meteoric dust, since rocket flights have shown the layers to occur in the deep temperature minimum of the mesosphere - coldest place in the atmosphere (140 K).   However, I recall that later studies have found there is a counterpart - PMWE (polar mesospheric winter echoes).  These are once again anomalously bright scattering patches at VHF and above seen with high power large aperture systems, although with different properties.  We know the wintertime Es peak is much weaker and variable compared to summertime, but if PMSE might be playing a part in these very interesting unusual paths, perhaps if one looked with the right eyes, one might find some of them in wintertime Es detections?




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Phil Erickson

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May 22, 2021, 10:07:09 AM5/22/21
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PS: PMWE has been measured with a rocket campaign in 2018 and the results just published a couple months ago:


  The article has a mini-review of some of the earlier PMSE work as well.  Essentially, the scattering is driven by neutral air turbulence which is strong enough to create coherent Bragg reflection layers in the D region including the key electrons - and this is what causes VHF scatter:

"Our measurements ultimately show that: a) polar winter mesosphere is abounded with meteor smoke particles (MSP) and intermittent turbulent layers, b) all PMWE observed during this campaign can be explained by neutral air turbulence, c) turbulence creates small-scale structures in all D-region constituents, including free electrons; d) MSP ultimately influence the radar volume reflectivity by distorting the turbulence spectrum of electrons, e) the influence of MSP and of background electron density is just to increase SNR."

  As Ethan says, it would be quite interesting to try and connect PMSE and PMWE to these unusual paths.

Jim Bacon

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May 22, 2021, 10:46:20 AM5/22/21
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Phil, Ethan and Co.  Many thanks for the useful links, plenty for me to read there. 

I just ran a quick analysis of the ionosonde at Roquetes in NE Spain close to the strong European polar front jet stream (max wind of order 140kt) and it shows a strong response in the foEs trace and picks up the relationship to the descending node of the semi diurnal tide?, a feature I’m seeing in a lot of the analyses this season.  Not entirely clear how important each factor is yet.  For example is it the lower limit of the descending node, usually goes down to 95-100km for a good opening, but notice today it levelled off at 110km, perhaps the second semidiurnal tide will take it lower later?, or is the strong response related to the strength of the jet stream.  I’m sure this’ll keep me occupied this season, been enjoying getting into Python and matplotlib though…

73 de Jim
g3yla 



<image001.gif>

 


From: ham...@googlegroups.com [mailto:ham...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Jim Bacon
Sent: Saturday, May 22, 2021 8:16 AM
To: 'Steve Nichols' via HamSCI
Subject: Re: [HamSCI] Today's transatlantic 50-MHz opening

 

Hi Joe,

 

Interesting to hear of the Pacific paths, on a similar note I was very pleased with the transAtlantic paths on the 19th May from here and managed to work 2 Ws and a VE on 6m CW using 80m doublet… not a big station, hi.

 

These did appear to correlate well with the jet stream orientation across the Atlantic and, as you said about the other paths recently, tied in with the the big storm systems on the synoptic charts. I have had a quick look at the Es Probability Index (EPI) plot for the Pacific for 23z on the 21st May (the charts overwrite, so cannot go back beyond then) You will note from the EPI plot that there were several ideally spaced maxima across the Pacific to provide a possibility for the path. The orange/red colour scale picks out the maxima in the jet stream cores and are probably identifying the most likely steps along the path to find an Es patch. I don’t not have the surface synoptic weather chart, but would expect to find a low pressure area  over the western States and another in mid Pacific and perhaps (off the left edge of the image) another surface low nearer Japan.

 

Thanks for flagging this event Joe, I must confess to not checking the Pacific region regularly, so its now on the list!

 

73 de Jim

g3yla

 

<image004.gif>

David Themens

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May 22, 2021, 12:37:45 PM5/22/21
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Hey,

Went through the Ebro Observatory (Roquetes) dataset manually for fun. Here's the summary and data, for those interested.

Cheers,

David

image.png

EB040_20210521(141).TXT

Jim Kennedy

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May 22, 2021, 1:42:22 PM5/22/21
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All:

My thanks to all who passed around the two papers I that I did (with Gene Zimmerman’s participation) during the last cycle.

I hope it will be helpful.  Nevertheless, there is still much more we don’t know yet.  (It wouldn’t be as much fun, otherwise.)

73,

Jim
K6MIO/4


<image001.gif>

 


From: ham...@googlegroups.com [mailto:ham...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Jim Bacon
Sent: Saturday, May 22, 2021 8:16 AM
To: 'Steve Nichols' via HamSCI
Subject: Re: [HamSCI] Today's transatlantic 50-MHz opening

 

Hi Joe,

 

Interesting to hear of the Pacific paths, on a similar note I was very pleased with the transAtlantic paths on the 19th May from here and managed to work 2 Ws and a VE on 6m CW using 80m doublet… not a big station, hi.

 

These did appear to correlate well with the jet stream orientation across the Atlantic and, as you said about the other paths recently, tied in with the the big storm systems on the synoptic charts. I have had a quick look at the Es Probability Index (EPI) plot for the Pacific for 23z on the 21st May (the charts overwrite, so cannot go back beyond then) You will note from the EPI plot that there were several ideally spaced maxima across the Pacific to provide a possibility for the path. The orange/red colour scale picks out the maxima in the jet stream cores and are probably identifying the most likely steps along the path to find an Es patch. I don’t not have the surface synoptic weather chart, but would expect to find a low pressure area  over the western States and another in mid Pacific and perhaps (off the left edge of the image) another surface low nearer Japan.

 

Thanks for flagging this event Joe, I must confess to not checking the Pacific region regularly, so its now on the list!

 

73 de Jim

g3yla

 

<image004.gif>

Gerald Creager

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May 22, 2021, 5:11:01 PM5/22/21
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From a weather standpoint, we've seen several large systems run across CONUS, with significant frontal activity likely to initiate atmospheric gravity waves. Several of those systems have moved rapidly across the Atlantic. Already we're starting to see activity in the Atlantic Basic and eastern Pacific of a tropical nature. I've not spent a lot of time looking at AGW caused by tropical cyclones but I think I'll spend some quality time looking at satellite data this season!

73
Gerry N5JXS

Capt Gerry Creager, CAP

SWR Health Services Officer
Weather and Environmental Support Officer -- Incident Management Team
OKWG Asst Dir Communications Planning


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Phil Erickson

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May 22, 2021, 7:42:56 PM5/22/21
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Hi all,

  The first attached is DXMaps 50 MHz propagation at the time of this writing.  The second is G3YLA's prediction.  Pretty remarkable if you ask me.

73
Phil W1PJE


Screen Shot 2021-05-22 at 7.40.48 PM.png
Screen Shot 2021-05-22 at 7.41.00 PM.png

Jim Bacon

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May 22, 2021, 8:20:11 PM5/22/21
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Thanks Phil,

That has been one of the better ones, the EPI areas need to be seen in general terms, but seem on this occasion to capture the main patterns of activity. Currently running a series of verification runs with a set of ionosondes so hope to have more to add after the season has offered up more samples. 

Interesting analysis of Ramey with a very steep descent rate for the semi-diurnal tidal node …, see below.

73 Jim



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<Screen Shot 2021-05-22 at 7.40.48 PM.png><Screen Shot 2021-05-22 at 7.41.00 PM.png>

Terry Bullett

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May 24, 2021, 12:12:38 AM5/24/21
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Jim,

Not all Es is the same. The wind shears are different in the summer.  Like this data from the ancient Boulder Digisonde. 





I can not believe there is a 9  or 14 MHz plasma frequency in the E region.  This is radio scatter from plasma turbulence, enhanced by a background plasma provided by the convective wind shears.
Co-incidental with thunderstorm season.
This is the stuff of VHF scattering we often see monitoring low VHF television transmitters.

The Lowell software is totally confused by Es obscuring the F layer.  And the radar data is so 1980....

With a modern radar, Vertical Es can be > 20 MHz. 



The strength of the scatter (> 60 dB over local noise)  is unexplained.

 

73,
Terry
W0ASP 

Jim Bacon

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May 24, 2021, 12:08:45 PM5/24/21
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Hi Terry,

Thanks for that insight… there’s always more to everything than first appears!  Its certainly given me a new area to get my head around. 

Is there a good reference for this dilemma about interpretation of the traditional ionosondes? Since they are my source of information in your world, I am grateful for the note of caution.

I do have one follow-up question Terry, noting your reference to the thunderstorm season and convective shears, do you also see any VHF scattering returns when there is a broad upper ridge and no thunderstorm activity?

Thanks again for the pointers…

73 de Jim
g3yla

On 24 May 2021, at 05:12, 'Terry Bullett' via HamSCI <ham...@googlegroups.com> wrote:

Jim,

Not all Es is the same. The wind shears are different in the summer.  Like this data from the ancient Boulder Digisonde. 



<fhjoplgfcfheehai.png>


I can not believe there is a 9  or 14 MHz plasma frequency in the E region.  This is radio scatter from plasma turbulence, enhanced by a background plasma provided by the convective wind shears.
Co-incidental with thunderstorm season.
This is the stuff of VHF scattering we often see monitoring low VHF television transmitters.

The Lowell software is totally confused by Es obscuring the F layer.  And the radar data is so 1980....

With a modern radar, Vertical Es can be > 20 MHz. 

<dgbfkfanaceolpic.png>


The strength of the scatter (> 60 dB over local noise)  is unexplained.

 

73,
Terry
W0ASP 

 



On 5/22/21 6:20 PM, Jim Bacon wrote:
Thanks Phil,

That has been one of the better ones, the EPI areas need to be seen in general terms, but seem on this occasion to capture the main patterns of activity. Currently running a series of verification runs with a set of ionosondes so hope to have more to add after the season has offered up more samples. 

Interesting analysis of Ramey with a very steep descent rate for the semi-diurnal tidal node …, see below.

73 Jim

<Ramey 22May21 Fig2.png>

Terry Bullett

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May 24, 2021, 2:50:50 PM5/24/21
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Hi Jim,

The UAG-23A is the incomprehensible tome of ancient wisdom used for scaling ionograms. 
ftp://ftp.ngdc.noaa.gov/ionosonde/documentation/UAG_23A_indexed.pdf
It has not been updated to consider modern (post 1978) instrumentation.
In the days of hand scaling and film ionograms. the rules were set out for consistency in favor of geophysical accuracy.
Autoscalers have introduced their own set of rules (undocumented, of course).

With regard to Es:
The h'Es is fairly straightforward, but what was lost in auto scaling is the Type of Es.  There are, among many types, High and Low type.  Low type is below any discernible solar generated E layer while the high type shows range retardation due to underlying ionization. There use to be fbEs, blanketing frequency.  This is no longer autoscaled.  It means that for everywhere in the field of view of the ionosonde, there was at least FbEs of plasma density with enough thickness to provide total reflection and lower frequencies could not penetrate int o the F layers. 
There is foEs, o meaning Ordinary mode wave became popular in the 80's with polarization sensitive sounding.  It is intended to signify that SOMEWHERE in the field of view there was enough Es plasma density to support spectacular reflections.
The autoscalers no longer provide FtEs (t for top) meaning the highest Es observable without any consideration of the propagation mechanism.  In fact there is not even a place for this value in the standard archive data formats.

As for VHF scatter, one problem with monitoring the carriers of TV stations is transmitter ID.  There are often several pilot tones observable, nominally through meteor scatter.  So I am never sure exactly the location of the scattering volume.
For this reason among others, I have never tried to correlate scattering events to terrestrial weather events.  My point is the two are seasonally correlated.

I'm not sure any individual buoyancy waves penetrate the stratosphere wind shears.  Theories say these grow in intensity and break, depositing their energy as heat and turbulence.   I know for a fact that infrasonic waves can propagate up to the F layer, but these are true sound waves.

73,
Terry
W0ASP           

James Secan

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May 24, 2021, 3:19:25 PM5/24/21
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In working on an update to the WBMOD scintillation model last year I ran across these two old papers from 1968 (in my oldies-but-goodies pile) discussing various aspects of Es parameters observed by ionosondes. These are back from the days Terry alluded to when soundings were hand scaled and, to a much greater extent than today, quality controlled.

Reddy, C. A., and M. M. Rao (1968), On the physical significance of the Es parameters fbEs, fEs, and foEs, J. Geophys. Res., 73, 215-224.

Reddy, C. A. (1968), Physical significance of the Es parameters fbEs, fEs, and foEs, 2. Causes of partial reflections from Es, J. Geophys. Res., 73, 5627-5647.

Jim
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Jim Bacon

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May 25, 2021, 12:07:05 PM5/25/21
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Hi Jim and Terry,

Many thanks for the useful references on the decoding of ionosondes, like everything its always more complicated than first imagined. I have always wondered how much of the decode is automated these days, and have sometimes spotted quite big differences between Artist 4 and 5 interpretations.

Appreciate the sharing of those nuggets…

73 de Jim
g3yla
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WILLIAM n SUSIE ENGELKE

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May 25, 2021, 5:50:46 PM5/25/21
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6 Meters is open to Japan right now.   2021-05-25 21:50 Z     -73- Bill, AB4EJ


WILLIAM n SUSIE ENGELKE

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May 25, 2021, 5:55:58 PM5/25/21
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Jim Bacon

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May 25, 2021, 6:25:54 PM5/25/21
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Hi Bill,

Do you have a callsign for the JA station so I can plot a path?

73 de Jim
g3yla


Ethan Miller K8GU

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May 25, 2021, 7:00:27 PM5/25/21
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I’m watching my ALL.TXT get longer via ssh from my daughter’s softball game!  Only a few decodes on JAs here, all in -17 range.

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Jim Bacon

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May 25, 2021, 8:38:46 PM5/25/21
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Thanks Ethan,

Looks to just about be there, although cannot currently scroll the map far enough west to JA, but think this will show there are a number of reasonably spaced enhanced regions for the EPI index for much of the route.  73 de Jim  g3yla



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Terry Bullett

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May 25, 2021, 9:04:37 PM5/25/21
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These data are rather useful.  Thanks to Nathaniel for herding the cats!

On the propagation and interpretation  side, consider that a single hop Es is at best 1000 km.  And Es has a very short horizontal correlation scale.  It would take many coincidental Es reflections to reach Japan from Eastern US.
Is this just hitting the lottery? 

Terry
W0ASP

Ethan Miller K8GU

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May 26, 2021, 7:06:23 AM5/26/21
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Terry,

I think "lottery" is the right term, although it's more like one of those better-odds scratch-off games that some lotteries run where you win another lottery ticket for every ten times you play or something.  (I don't actually know anything about lotteries except the stock market.)  It's a lot of hops.

These "openings" tend to wander around geographically over time; I'd be hard-pressed to pull out a number of geophysical significance.  But, you usually have 5-10 minutes to work any given station---they will fade in and out.

73,

--Ethan, K8GU.



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Ethan Miller K8GU

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May 26, 2021, 7:08:11 AM5/26/21
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Jim,

Here is my ALL.TXT file from yesterday filtered for JA callsigns.  You can see that my big-gun neighbors were more successful than I was (because I wasn't at the radio save for seeing a couple of decodes as I dashed out the door).


73,

--Ethan, K8GU.




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Jim Bacon

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May 26, 2021, 7:35:33 AM5/26/21
to 'Steve Nichols' via HamSCI
A couple of follow-up points Terry, in Europe we regularly have Es QSOs 1500-2500km with extreme ranges for single hops being about 3000km, this is based upon multiple crossings of paths on dx cluster maps, which suggest a single area for the active Es. I must look at some stats for median values but would expect them to be compatible with Es at about 100-110km. I am of the notion that typical multi-hop paths are 3-5 hops and the majority of those longer paths will have a sea point for many of the grazing contacts with the surface. 

Meteorologically, the alignment of successive regions of potential atmospheric gravity wave sources from jet streams is not so unusual as some might imagine.  A buckled flow is quite common at certain times of the year and in the northern summer hemisphere the meandering jet streams do track well north of their winter latitude zones.  Could be seen as hitting the lottery, but getting one of the lesser prizes, I suspect.  

As a  background for those not involved in the meteorological domain; another worthwhile fact about such patterns is that they tend to hang around for a few days until the meandering flow buckles so much that small cut-off upper lows form in the base of the disrupting upper trough. The geometry will of course change the phasing of the upper pattern in relation to a given part of the country, so different regions will become the 'chosen ones’ for the Es opening.  A general rule is that the shorter wavelength undulations translate quickly through the pattern, whereas when the amplitude increases too much and the flow buckles or disrupts, the pattern’ s eastward translation slows down considerably and therefore any resultant opening may repeat over successive days.

Anyway, its all very interesting to see these lottery wins coming up now and again and hope you’ve got your tickets  hi …

73 de Jim
g3yla

 

On 26 May 2021, at 02:04, 'Terry Bullett' via HamSCI <ham...@googlegroups.com> wrote:

These data are rather useful.  Thanks to Nathaniel for herding the cats!

On the propagation and interpretation  side, consider that a single hop Es is at best 1000 km.  And Es has a very short horizontal correlation scale.  It would take many coincidental Es reflections to reach Japan from Eastern US.
Is this just hitting the lottery? 

Terry
W0ASP

On 5/25/21 6:38 PM, Jim Bacon wrote:
Thanks Ethan,

Looks to just about be there, although cannot currently scroll the map far enough west to JA, but think this will show there are a number of reasonably spaced enhanced regions for the EPI index for much of the route.  73 de Jim  g3yla

<EPI_AD4EJ_JA2IGY_50MHz_22Z25MAY2021.png>

Joe Dzekevich

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May 26, 2021, 9:15:02 AM5/26/21
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From here is New England, we do get Southern paths over water to the Southern Caribbean and Northern South America on 6m.  A few days back, I got a FT8 contact in St. Lucia, which was about 3,300 Km. It was also interesting to note that a tropical storm was fading out East of the center of the path, which may have spawned some additional Es about it.

 

And my lottery ticket never comes in.  LOL.

 

Joe, K1YOW

 


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Joe Dzekevich

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May 30, 2021, 10:42:27 AM5/30/21
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Six meters is a bit strange (new scientific term) this morning (Sun May 30 2021, 13:30 UTC).  Earlier I saw on DX Maps two stations on the Western African coast working the Eastern US.  Then I worked a couple of VO1s North of me with QSB from +20 to fading out on FT8.  Then I heard and called (no contact) three stations in Kazakhstan - now that is a 6,000 mile path over the pole, but their signals were strongest for me beamed East.  A few of the big guns managed to work them from New England USA. Then I worked the Canary Islands off of the West African coast, then back to VO1 land.  Just a strange day all over the place on 6m FT8.  
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