SB PROP @ ARL $ARLP003 ARLP003 Propagation de K7RA ZCZC AP03 QST de W1AW Propagation Forecast Bulletin 3 ARLP003 >From Tad Cook, K7RA Seattle, WA January 20, 2012 To all radio amateurs
SB PROP ARL ARLP003 ARLP003 Propagation de K7RA New sunspot groups appeared on every day over the past reporting week (January 12-18), until yesterday, January 19 which had no new spots. On January 12, new sunspot group 1396 appeared, and the next day two more - 1397 and 1398 - popped into view. On January 14 four new sunspot groups appeared: 1399, 1400, 1401 and 1402. January 15 saw group 1391 vanish and new group 1403 emerge. Two more appeared January 16 - 1404 and 1405 - while 1397 vanished. On January 17, 1406 appeared and 1395 disappeared while 1407 emerged on January 18. Average daily sunspot numbers rose this week from 90.6 to 116.9, or 29%. But solar flux was about the same, changing from 134.9 to 133.4. The latest prediction from USAF/NOAA has a solar flux of 150 on January 20-21, 155 on January 22, 160 on January 23-27, 140 on January 28-29, and 135 on January 30 through February 6. We are still looking for a solar flux peak of 165 on February 17-21. The predicted flux values of 160 on January 23-27 are markedly higher than the 145 predicted last week for the same dates. Predicted planetary A index is 6, 10, 8, 10 and 8 on January 20-24 and 5 on January 25 through February 1, 6 on February 2-4, and 5 on February 5-8. Roger Larson, KF6IVA of Harrison, Maine wrote and referred to errors in the solar article in The Atlantic which was linked from last week's Propagation Forecast Bulletin ARLP002. I think perhaps he is referring to the article's statement that "Hydrogen, the lightest element and the Sun's primary constituent, fuses to become Helium, releasing energy." Roger wrote: "The Sun converts 600 million tons of hydrogen to 596 million tons of helium every second. The missing 4 million tons of matter are converted to energy by E = mc sq. The Sun is approximately 4.6 billion years old and will live another 4.6 billion years as a yellow main sequence star. The Sun has become about 30% more luminous since it began burning hydrogen (the faint Sun paradox). Earth's early atmosphere had more greenhouse gases which allowed the surface temperature to be warm enough for life to form. It is also thought that in 100 million years or so the Sun will become more luminous and may cause Earth's temperature to become too hot to support life. Currently the green house gases raise the surface temperature about 60 degrees F. In 4.6 billion years the core of the Sun will run out of hydrogen, the Sun will begin to swell and the helium in the core will fuse to carbon and oxygen. The Sun may swallow the Earth in its giant phase which will last about 1 billion years. The Sun will never go supernova (it does not have enough mass) nor will it be able to burn carbon or oxygen. It will puff off its outer envelope and become a white dwarf." We mentioned Belgian website http://www.spaceweatherlive.com in Propagation Forecast Bulletin ARLP003 on January 22, 2010. If you click on the Solar Activity link toward the top and select Sunspot Regions from the drop-down, it takes you to http://www.spaceweatherlive.com/en/solar-activity. When I see this early Friday morning (1145 UTC) it lists seven regions (sunspot groups) in the table and gives the number of sunspots in each. You may recall from past bulletins that the daily sunspot number is calculated by multiplying the number of regions by ten, then adding one for each sunspot. As there are 7 regions and 47 spots, the sunspot number would be 70 plus 47, or 117. When I look at http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/ftpdir/indices/DSD.txt I see that the sunspot number for January 19 is 117. If you click on the image of the Sun to the left of the table, it takes you to http://www.spaceweatherlive.com/en/solar-activity/sunspot-regions. Here are details and recent images for each sunspot group. You can also see details on these at http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/ftpmenu/forecasts/SRS.html. Note the daily reports are shown with the date for the following day. So the January 19 report was issued in the early part of January 20, so it gets a January 20 date. Note the Space Weather Live site offers an email aurora alert at http://www.spaceweatherlive.com/en/aurora-alertmail. On Wednesday, Science Daily published a brief article on the Solar Dynamics Observatory at http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/01/120118203110.htm. Charlie Carroll, K1XX of Grant, Florida (on Florida's East Coast, about 70 miles southeast of Orlando) notes that the ARRL CW DX Contest is February 18-19, right in the midst of that period (February 17-21) in which NOAA predicts solar flux values of 165. See http://www.arrl.org/arrl-dx for details on the contest. He is looking forward to operating PJ4X in Bonaire for the contest, so he is watching this prediction closely. Jon Jones, N0JK wonders if a solar flux value of 165 in February is a bit too optimistic. He also wonders if Cycle 24 will have two peaks like Cycle 23, the first peak being in November 2011. Jon notes there was some good 6 meter sporadic-E skip on Wednesday night (Thursday January 19, UTC time) around 0420-0530 UTC from Kansas and Colorado into Mexico, and "east coast stations had Es to C6 with link on to PY, LU, CE." There seems to be energy from a solar flare headed our way; however, on Thursday the prediction at http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/ftpmenu/forecasts/45DF.html for January 19 showed planetary A index rising to 10 on Saturday (January 21), 8 on Sunday, and 10 again on Monday. That doesn't seem like a large effect, but perhaps Friday's forecast will be more dramatic. MSNBC has a piece on the flare at http://cosmiclog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/01/19/10192639-solar-blast-heading-our-way and National Geographic at http://newswatch.nationalgeographic.com/2012/01/19/new-video-solar-flare-spied-on-candy-colored-sun/. Also check Universe Today at http://www.universetoday.com/92780/aurora-alert-sun-sends-cme-in-earths-direction/. As always, http://www.spaceweather.com/ has frequent and timely updates. On Thursday they said the flare was at 1630 UTC on January 19 and came from sunspot group 1401. Spaceweather.com mentioned an impact centered on 2230 UTC on Saturday, January 21, with an ambiguity of plus or minus seven hours. Vic Alfonsi, WA6MCL of Corona, California was on 18.074 MHz running 100 watts on CW into a dipole at 1750 UTC on January 14. He said he "was in QSO with Mitch NH6JC/M while he was in his vehicle watching the Sun rise over the water on Kauai. He had good signal, usual 17 meter stuff, very strong but little signal meter reading. Very low S/N. Many Midwest stations were calling him. "After the QSO with Mitch, Bill, K2TQC called him and although very strong here in Corona CA it was hard to copy. I quickly realized that he had a very strong echo. His signal from Syracuse NY was 599 and his 1.5 second delay echo was 589. I moved him off freq. and he confirmed same on me. "I know in previous reports you mention that on 80 but never heard that before on 18 MHz. His QRZ info says he runs power and loops so he was not using a beam." Vic thinks he and Bill may have heard both long path and short path signals. Victor Paul, WB0TEV of Greenville, Texas sent a link to the same geomagnetic observatory from where until recently we received weekly geomagnetic forecasts. The link is http://www.ig.cas.cz/en/structure/observatories/geomagnetic-observatory-budkov/forecast-of-geomagnetic-activity/. Unfortunately, the retiring staff member (F. Zloch) was the one who actually wrote the predictions we used. Upon his recent retirement after 34 years, nobody there is doing the same predictions. At the link referenced above, you can see local K index readings but the only predictive function is the remark for the following day, such as "Quiet" or "Unsettled to Active." If you would like to make a comment or have a tip for our readers, email the author at, k...@arrl.net. For more information concerning radio propagation, see the ARRL Technical Information Service web page at http://arrl.org/propagation-of-rf-signals. For an explanation of the numbers used in this bulletin, see http://arrl.org/the-sun-the-earth-the-ionosphere. An archive of past propagation bulletins is at http://arrl.org/w1aw-bulletins-archive-propagation. Find more good information and tutorials on propagation at http://myplace.frontier.com/~k9la/. Monthly propagation charts between four USA regions and twelve overseas locations are at http://arrl.org/propagation. Instructions for starting or ending email distribution of ARRL bulletins are at http://arrl.org/bulletins. Sunspot numbers for January 12 through 18 were 57, 81, 145, 141, 120, 152, and 122, with a mean of 116.9. 10.7 cm flux was 116.8, 124.1, 132.3, 133.5, 139.7, 139, and 148.1, with a mean of 133.4. Estimated planetary A indices were 5, 6, 3, 3, 8, 5, and 4, with a mean of 4.9. Estimated mid-latitude A indices were 5, 8, 3, 4, 8, 4, and 4, with a mean of 5.1. NNNN /EX ----------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe or subscribe to this list. Please send a message to imail...@njdxa.org In the message body put either unsubscribe dx-news or subscribe dx-news This is the DX-NEWS reflector sponsored by the NJDXA http://njdxa.org -----------------------------------------------------------
