Perseids Meteor Shower

This peaks early next week and it can lead to enhanced VHF conditions with signals reflected off ionised meteor trails. The peak is August 12/13th.

See https://www.rmg.co.uk/stories/topics/perseid-meteor-shower-guide-uk-when-where-to-see .

Perseids meteor shower

Many people like to make VHF contacts in meteor showers. Modes like FT4 and FT8 should be particularly effective I think. Signals are often strong, but short lived.

I see Southgate News has a link about this.

See http://www.southgatearc.org/news/2020/august/perseid-meteor-alert.htm#.Xy570jfYq00

Perseids Meteor Shower

Southgate News reports on the Perseids Meteor Shower that reaches its peak soon.

Perseid Meteor Shower

See http://spaceweather.com/ which writes:

"This week, Earth is entering a stream of debris from huge comet 109P/Swift-Tuttle, source of the annual Perseid meteor shower. Specks of dusty debris hitting the top of Earth's atmosphere at 110,000 mph are burning up in the night sky, producing a spray of shooting stars from the constellation Perseus."

6m JT6M

In the end I looked on 50.230MHz last night, but only copied G4BAO who was working an OZ. I suspect I was copying John directly and not off MS pings. Tonight I'll try the newer JT6M frequency further up the band. Now back on 6m WSPR during the day and early evening.

UPDATE 0915z:  Plenty of 6m WSPR spots of G0OQK (98km) by tropo and aircraft reflection. He has also spotted me lots of times again.

UPDATE 0938z:  There were no overnight 10m WSPR spots. I thought I might have been spotted in Europe via the Perseids by MS but guess the 2 minute TX period, low power and Doppler were all against me. MS pings are much longer on 10m. In the past I have worked QRP SSB DX by 10m aurora but never tried 10m MS. Maybe I should. It is a pity there is not a 30sec WSPR mode!

Wispy WSPRs

Overnight I was looking for MS propagated WSPR signals on 10m. There were a few early morning decodes as well as plenty of evidence of MS bursts which were too short and too Doppler shifted to permit successful WSPR decoding.

Perseid meteor shower

Overnight tonight the Perseid meteor shower will peak with some dazzling displays in the early hours of Saturday morning if the sky is clear. With luck, MS conditions will be good on 10m, 6m, 4m and 2m with some long bursts. Not sure what band(s) to monitor but may see what can be heard/seen on JT6m on 6m.

Perseids meteor shower tonight

The Perseids meteor shower is supposed to be a strong one peaking this evening. I may run the WSPR software overnight on 10m to see if any bursts are long enough to support a 2 minute WSPR transmission.

LATER: Overnight I copied PA0PSY at 0044z by what looked like MS: quite strong signal, seen once only, with Doppler, over a 300km path, although it could also have been aircraft reflection. Unfortunately I didn't see the WSPR screen to examine the actual screen trace.

10m WSPR QRP DX - Perseids MS?

I ran WSPR with 5W out (20%) on 10m overnight and was heard twice by F4VNS in JN36hc (see report screen). Although I did not decode anyone on 10m overnight, this may be because there were few stations active on 10m WSPR. The few whispy traces seen suggest doppler shifting (possible MS)?

Anyone know when the Perseids peaked in Europe? I wonder if between 0230 and 0430z?

JT6m Perseids MS

Just turned on the FT817 and JT6M mode and copied HB9AGE within the first few seconds on a strong meteor burst. There will be plenty more tonight. The picture shows the capture of HB9AGE's CQ call here a few minutes ago. Also heard M0RJV, G4BAO (local) and PA5JS, all on JT6m.

10/6m WSPR

During the next 24 hours I intend to try WSPR mode beaconing on both 10m and 6m to see if I get any success during the peak of the Perseids meteor shower. I've no idea how this mode will work with MS and a basic QRP system with small antennas. Should you get a chance, do set your WSPR system to listen on 10m and 6m and log any reports to the WSPRnet logging site. Set your RX to 28.1246 MHz USB or 50.2930 MHz USB to receive WSPR signals.

Although probably not by MS propagation, my 10m WSPR signal was copied by S51CN tonight at 5w, 1W and then 50mW. At my lowest power setting the SNR was -22dB, suggesting that even 10mW would have been copied, but I've now run out of attenuators so can't get any lower tonight!

Bojan, S51CN kindly sent me a screenshot of my signals in Slovenia (see left).