Topband: propagation revisited

[N7DF]

after reading all the comments by others concerning their experiences with propagation during the cq160cw contest over the weekend i reviewed my log to see what was going on since my experience was so different---i found that, after i deducted the usual suspects that are always over s-9 nearly everything else was typical of spotlight effect---for instance in one 20 minute time slot 18 out of 22 contacts were from WI and another time similar results from FL---remember that i only operated search and pounce--similar results were for PA and WA with surprisingly few CA and almost no northwest stations heard--practically no new england stations were heard--in fact nearly all the QSOs were from within 700 miles of my QTH--normally i hear and work many weaker stations that are well below s9 but they were simply not there to work--in fact it seemed like there was not as much activity as i expected and there were numerous large multikhz holes on the band which is hardly ever the case--both PJ2T and KV4FZ had the loudest signals i have ever heard from them while a JA opening simply did not occur---the only conclusion i can reach is that the geomagnetic storm reported on spaceweather.com was affecting 160 meter propagation in an unusual way--- and only stations with certain transmission characteristics were propagating and their signals were not subject to the normal amount of adsorption --doing only  hunt and pounce gets pretty boring but i  am no good at QLF and do not type well left handed--if it was not for my AEA morse machine i would not be able to operate cw at all