Topband: Trans-polar Europe last night

[ve6wz at shaw.ca]

Last night I was able to log 5 EU on 160m CW. (This of course is the day after the Stew contest which gave me no EU propagation!)

At around 0200z, I checked my MW BCB recordings and had audio from Talksport UK on 1053 and 1089 kHz.
(I have 2 Perseus SDRs that record MW all night)
Indeed, this is always a good sign that 160m might be open. Later around 0330z the BCB signals were peaking up even better, and I also had audio from Moldova Vesti on 1413kHz, and Lithuania R. Baltic on 1386.

Karel OK1CF was CQ but his signal was not making it.
I decided to call CQ, and on my 3rd CQ Stig OZ4MM called in with a solid signal at 3:50z.
My daughter called on the phone, so I had to leave the radio, but I came back later and heard SM5EDX calling CQ.
John could not hear me calling since the QSB seemed fast and deep, so I went back to CQ.
Al  LY7M checked in with a tremendous signal and I continued to CQ but had no callers until 520z when John SM5EDX called in and we had a nice solid QSO.
About 5 minutes later Olav, LA7AFA called in with a fair signal.
John G3PQA called me about 3 times, and each time after sending his report, QSB took him away, but finally, at 530z we completed a nice solid QSO.

So this was clearly a very "northern" EU opening based on my QSOs and what I was hearing on MW. Also, I had no BCB audio from Spain which can be common when the band opens to EU.
I have 2 EU rx.  One phased Beverage pair at N. EU at 21 deg, and another pair at 42 deg. By far the best copy was on the polar 21 deg pair, while signals were at best a faint whisper on the 42 deg pair.
I RX in diversity, with the 21 deg in left ear, 42 deg in right ear. SO it seems perhaps the signals were squeaking over the pole last night.

If I had not checked my MW recordings, I would not have been encouraged to call CQ since the band looked completely dead, but then again, the only CQ was from Karel OK1CF.
Maybe we have all heard this before?? "If no one calls CQ, no one is going to have any QSOs"

I have no question at all about the power of FT-8 for cutting through the noise.  And indeed, it can be a great propagation test by looking at FT8 PSK reporter RBN.
I maintain that beyond the tremendous power of the FT8 decode algorithm, the fact that FT-8 ops can press "GO" on their PC and it "CQs" every 15 seconds for as long as you want greatly increases the odds of "hearing" a DX decode on a short QSB peak. How many CW ops are doing that? How many would want to do that?

Last night I CQ'd for over an hour and had no RBN hits in Europe even though I worked 5 guys.  The CW skimmer program can only decode when signals are quite solid.
Please do not conclude the band is "dead" just because you don't see any RBN skimmer spots from your CQ.
(I run 3 skimmer SDRS so I know what I'm talking about)

If you love CW, call CQ for a while when you are at the radio.
It's a lot more work than letting your PC do the FT8 CQ (every 15 seconds), but we can't know if the band is open (for our beloved CW) if we are all just listening.

73, de steve, ve6wz