Propagation News – 1 February 2015
The 2015 K1N DXpedition to Navassa Island in the Caribbean is due to start shortly. Navassa is just west of Haiti and is a 4,600 mile sea path from the UK, beaming 270 degrees. Let’s look at the propagation.
On 160m, that’s 1.8MHz, and 80m, 3.5MHz, you will need a mutual dark path between you and Navassa, from around 2300 to 0725UTC. Look for a dawn or grey line enhancement at or around sunrise, from about 0700 onwards.
On 40m, 7MHz, the time available to work K1N extends a little more, so you may hear them a bit earlier in the evening and some time after UK sunrise, perhaps even up to 0930 to 1000UTC.
On 30m, 10MHz, signals may be there for all 24 hours, although they will get stronger from about 2130 to 2200UTC and remain so throughout the night. Signals also get weaker from mid-morning.
On 20m, 14MHz, the loudest signals may be around noon and from 2030 to 2230UTC. D layer absorption will make signals worse in the mid afternoon.
The time slots then get shorter as we head further up the HF bands. On 17m, that’s 18MHz, the best time is around noon to 1400UTC. On 15m, 21MHz, 12m, 24MHz and 10m, 28MHz, the best times are mid to late afternoon.
Steve, G0KYA takes a more detailed look at UK propagation to Navassa online at g0kya.blogspot.com
VHF and up propagation news
The first part of this week is controlled by a winter low over the North Sea and some strong northwesterly winds over the British Isles. This is not a good omen for tropo enhancements on VHF and UHF.
The good news is that, although it remains cold, the second half of the week will see a trend towards transient ridges of high pressure and the tempting prospect of some lift conditions. This will mean some colder nights and there may be both surface temperature inversions overnight and morning, and longer lasting elevated inversions due to the high pressure. Paths to the south across Biscay and western France to Spain will be worth checking out.
For EME operators, next week the moon reaches apogee—its furthest point away—so we will see losses reaching their highest. Moon declination is falling and goes negative at the end of the week, giving increasingly shorter Moon windows.
We are still in the regular January to April gap between meteor showers, so look for the usual random meteor contacts in the early morning on 50 through to 144MHz. Sporadic-E openings are still very unlikely and there were no significant southern mainland European trans-equatorial QSOs reported to DXmaps.com.
Category: GB2RS Propagation News
