Message-ID: <000001c1af5e$c48ac560$2c417bd5@default>
From: "Alan Melia" <Alan.Melia@btinternet.com>
To: "LF-Group" <rsgb_lf_group@blacksheep.org>
Subject: LF: Propagation conditions
Date: Wed, 6 Feb 2002 20:24:46 -0000
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Hi all, CFH was certainly coming in again today around lunch time, but did
you notice the way it 'slid away'. I believe this signal peak may have been
due to a minor X-ray flare (M1.5) at the time. Flares do not leave any
lingering effects.

The daytime condition are declining again according to Brian's (CT1DRP)
daily plots of DCF39. CFH is not really a reliable pointer at the moment as
it seems to be in a test mode. Last evening looked as though it was going to
be poor, but the signal went off just as the stregnth was building up, at
about 2330. At this time of the year the best signals do not appear until
after 2400z, and again around 0500z. Dusk in Nova Scotia is about 2230 and
with Dex around 2300, it will normally take another 30 mins to an hour for
the signals to reach their best levels.

The problem at the moment is that there has been some coronal hole activity
as well as the minor flares and this has cause a rise in the Kp index to 4
over the last couple of days. I would normally not expect this to be a
significant damper on conditions, but the nightime DCF plot show very poor
levels and a great deal of rapid and deep fading. I suspect the geomagnetic
activity will just prolong this. As I have said before....I could just be
wrong (!!) and the effects of multipath fading are dramtically different
from one location to another. Lauries 73k signals were heard when I though
conditions should be difficult, but that may have been due to the longer
wavelength.

Good Hunting and Cheers de Alan G3NYK
alan.melia@btinternet.com