Topband: Where is everyone?

[Art Snapper]

Conditions here in Michigan on 80/160 were poor last night. The signals
were weak and band noise was high. I managed to work Mali on 40, and
Hungary on 80, but it was a battle. South America was extremely poor on 80
for some reason.
Art NK8X
On Oct 22, 2016 2:03 AM, "Donald Chester" <k4kyv at hotmail.com> wrote:

>
> Here it is Friday  night, with relatively little QRN, but only a couple of
> signals are audible across the entire 160m band.  80/75m has a few more
> signals than that, but it's sparsely occupied as well.  Usually by this
> late in the season one will hear plenty of activity in the evening,
> especially on weekends.  I have noticed this dearth of activity for several
> weeks now; it's as if this year's radio season hasn't got off the ground
> yet, despite the fact that we are almost midway through autumn and the
> summer QRN has substantially subsided.
>
> Is this a trend, and is this becoming the new normal?  They keep telling
> us we now have a record number of hams in the FCC data base, over 700,000.
> Those hams certainly aren't on the air, at least not on 160, 80 or 40m.  I
> can  remember not that many years ago when at this stage in the season on a
> quiet weekend night one had to scout around to find a clear spot to call
> CQ.  So far this year, the bands have all had vast swathes of unused
> frequencies, but the signals that are heard appear to be at normal
> strength, so the  bands apparently aren't dead.
>
> Don k4kyv
> _________________
> Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
>