I have been amazed at the claimed QSO counts I have seen from single ops here
stateside for 15 meters! It is great to see somebody had propagation on 15
meters.
For me the band was NOT OPEN as it seems to have been for many others.
After talking
to some other people in the "RF BLACK HOLE" of the Midwest I find comfort
(hi hi)
in knowing that I indeed was not alone in this "RF BLACK HOLE". It seems
that there
must have been some "anomoly" at work as we could hear many stations
working EUROPE
but never did hear the EUROPEANS they were working. I had one ham in Iowa
tell me
that the band for them was not open for both days of the contest.
>From some of the hams in the northern part of the "Black Hole" even stacked
arrays
of monobanders for 15m did not help. The band here had a strange sound to
it. It
sounded as if we were in a barrel. It reminded me of being on the grayline
and the
band was switching from a short path to long path, yet NEVER switching.
Could it have been something to do with the geomagnetic field going through
this
area?
ANYWAY for an HONEST HARD effort I ended up with only 432 qsos. A far cry
from some of
the 1200-1500+ qso counts I have seen posted and told of. So guys just
remember that
even though you think you have had a bad weekend.... Just remember some of
us poor
souls in the "RF BLACK HOLE" of the midwest (hi hi hi)
HEY CAN WE HANDICAP OURS SCORES?? (LOL!)
Jerry W8LR
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