We had another lucky week with quite a high solar flux index, low Kp geomagnetic numbers, few solar flares and no coronal mass ejections, or CMEs, of note. In fact, you couldn’t ask for better! But is that all about to change? With nine active solar regions on the Sun’s surface and the return of […]

Today, the 23 June, the 50MHz CW Contest runs from 0900 to 1200UTC. Using CW on the 6m band, the exchange is signal report, serial number and locator. On Tuesday 25 June, the SHF UK Activity Contest runs from 1830 to 2130UTC. Using all modes on 2.3 to 10GHz frequencies, the exchange is signal report, […]

We had a relatively quiet week, with the Sun generally being settled. There were coronal mass ejections, but they were on the far side of the Sun and not Earth-directed. There were no X-class flares, although we did have a few C- and M-class events. The solar flux index declined to 167 but has since […]

Last week was characterised by relatively-quiet geomagnetic conditions and a fairly-high solar flux. But is that all about to change? Active region 3664 has returned. It is now named 3697 and has already emitted an X1.4-class solar flare. You may recall that it was AR 3664 that caused the aurora that was visible all over […]

Disrupted solar conditions continued this week with X-class solar flares aplenty. Four X-class events on the 8 and 9 May prompted coronal mass ejections, which could join together to impact the Earth this weekend. We can expect a strong G3 event with the Kp index rising to 6 and the potential for visible aurora in […]

What a strange week we had; with the solar flux index in the 167 range, falling to 130, conditions should have been reasonable, but the Kp index hit 4 and even 5.33 on the evening of Friday 26 April, which meant propagation on Saturday the 27th was truly dire. Stations taking part in International Marconi […]

The Sun is still looking a little bare, but the solar flux index has climbed back to 131, as of Thursday 11 April, with four active regions. The promise is that things will improve, especially as we will soon see the return of active region 3615, which was the source of numerous M-class and one […]