Propagation News – 13 November 2022
Last week was a mixed bag in terms of space weather. Yes, the solar flux index increased to 138 by Thursday 10 November, but at the same time we had a fast solar wind and a solar flare from active region AR 3141 to contend with.
The Kp index hit five on Monday 7 November after a prolonged period with the Bz component of the interplanetary magnetic field pointing south. When the Bz points south it more easily couples with the Earth’s magnetic field, allowing solar plasma to flood in.
The Bz component of the IMF then shifted north, which helped conditions improve over the week. In fact, the Kp index was down to zero for the latter half of Wednesday and Thursday.
With no coronal holes, this was about as good as it could get for HF and the bands didn’t disappoint. The MUF over a 3,000km path reached 38MHz around lunchtime on Thursday. DX worked from the UK included A35GC in Tonga, 7X3WPL in Algeria and P29RO in Papua New Guinea.
The KQ2H 10m FM repeater on 29.620MHz is acting like a beacon this Autumn, often hitting S9 plus in the early afternoon. Running 1.5kW from the Catskill Mountains in up-state New York, it is a good indicator of trans-Atlantic conditions.
Next week NOAA predicts that the solar flux index will decline a little, placing it in the region of 120. Geomagnetic conditions may remain settled, at least until 18 November when NOAA predicts the Kp index could rise to five.
That said, it would only take a solar flare, and associated coronal mass ejection, from one of the large sunspots visible at the moment to spoil things.
VHF and up
The main weather theme for this weekend is the very long moist airflow from the Azores to the UK and onwards to western Scandinavia.
Because high pressure will be just to the east of the UK at first this will probably lead to some potentially long-range Tropo conditions from western Europe down to the Canaries and Spain/Portugal.
A cold front will probably cut the Azores out of the best conditions. However, we should also be able to make use of good conditions into Europe and particularly across the North Sea to southern Scandinavia and perhaps parts of the Baltic.
All this is fine until the next change-over to unsettled weather rolls in from the Atlantic on Monday night and during Tuesday. After then, it will be windy with rain or showers and a small chance of some fast-moving rain-scatter from heavy showers.
The Leonids meteor shower peaks on Thursday 17 November, plus expect an encounter with a dust trail on 19 November. It’s predicted to occur at around 0600UTC with a short-lived high ZHR between 50 and 200, but activity level is uncertain.
This is a good week to check out meteor scatter options and there have continued to be some occasional reminders that the solar conditions are capable of sending some higher Kp indices our way with attendant chance of auroral conditions, so stay alert to the Kp index values.
The Moon is at maximum declination so we have long Moon windows and zenith angles up to 65 degrees in the UK. Path losses are still low but with apogee today, path losses are at their highest. 144MHz sky noise is low all week.
Category: GB2RS Propagation News
