Propagation News – 25 December 2022

The solar flux index stayed around 150 over the last week, bringing some choice DX to the higher HF bands. However, solar flares continue to plague us, bringing short-lived band fade-outs at times. These have all been moderate C and M-class flares. It is uncertain as to whether or not there will be an X-class flare soon.

Meanwhile, try and work some Arctic Circle DX. Santa’s broadcasting arm, Santa Radio, OF9X, will be active again, on all amateur radio bands, using CW, SSB and digital modes until the end of the year. On any band, from 10MHz and up, it should be fine to make contact with OF9X during the day, with 80m and 40m being ideal for night-time contact. The DX cluster is probably the best way to find where they are operating.

NOAA predicts that the solar flux may decline slightly over the next week, perhaps going down to 125. But then it should rebound, maybe making it to 160 by the first week of January.

Unfortunately solarham.com is currently offline. Kevin, VE3EN—who produces the site—says that hopefully this downtime will be short-lived. Keep an eye on the URL as it remains one of the most useful sites for radio amateurs.

VHF and up

There will be a very unsettled flavour to the Christmas propagation weather with many lows tracking across the country into the New Year. There will be spells of strong winds to provide a few nail-biting moments for antennas, but the main theme is for bands of rain and heavy showers. These will be capable of producing some rain scatter on the GHz bands on most days in one part of the country or another. Cold air will be present at times to give some snow scatter in places, although primarily over northern Britain.

The chances of traditional high pressure systems bringing some festive tropo are very low indeed with the nearest high displaced well away over south-east Europe. The solar conditions will doubtless be worth considering as a possible indicator of auroral propagation if the Kp index rises above about five or six.

Mid-winter sporadic E can surprise us over the period from now to roughly mid-January. A good example was shown on the Dourbes ionosonde on Monday, 19 December when the sporadic E critical frequency reached 5.45MHz at 2300UTC and coincided with a jet stream nearby.

There will be plenty of jet stream activity, so it is well worth checking the clusters. Don’t be too fixed upon the usual times for sporadic E since these events tend to be driven by the timing of significant weather features.

For meteor scatter enthusiasts, the Leonis Minorids are still active but past their maximum, so we await the Quadrantids to peak with a zenithal hourly rate of around 120 between 3 and 4 January.

Unlike other meteor showers that tend to stay at their peak for about two days, the peak period of the Quadrantids lasts only a few hours.

Moon declination is rising, so Moon windows will continue to lengthen, and zenith angles increase, while EME path losses increase after Christmas Eve’s perigee. 144MHz sky noise is low all week.

Category: GB2RS Propagation News