The mild unsettled weather pattern is probably going to transform into a cold unsettled pattern during the next week, but staying essentially unsettled with active weather fronts or heavy showers bringing plenty of opportunity for rain scatter on the GHz bands. Once again, it seems that Tropo will be limited, although like last week it can enhance conditions temporarily in between active weather systems.

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After the good Auroral and Auroral E propagation on VHF of early last week, we are in quieter territory now, although as usual a daily check on the Kp index will ensure you keep in touch with any sign of a recurrence. As for meteor scatter, we are now firmly in the random meteor period for several weeks and, with no major showers available, the best times will usually be in the early hours before sunrise.

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Lastly, a mention of Sporadic-E, which might crop up as brief spikes on the www.propquest.co.uk graphs. The foEs values (in January) show as isolated peaks to 5-7MHz, which is approximately equivalent to 10m and 6m. Perhaps a good way to see where the prospects exist is by using dxmaps.com to find current Es paths on 10m and 6m.

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A second hint can be found by looking at the Es blog tab on Propquest to see where the main weather jet streams are located, since Es paths are often associated with jet streams, especially where they cross mountain ranges like the Pyrenees or Alps.

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July this year sees maximum Moon declination coinciding with lowest path losses in the Northern Hemisphere, so there’s never been a better time to get QRV on EME.

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This week, Moon declination is positive and rising, so Moon window length and peak elevation are increasing. Path losses are falling as we approach perigee on the 29th. 144 MHz sky noise is low, rising to moderate on the 29th.

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