The FCC recently released this public notice:

PUBLIC SAFETY AND HOMELAND SECURITY BUREAU SEEKS COMMENT ON THE IMPACTS OF THE MAY 2024 GEOMAGENTIC STORM ON THE U.S. COMMUNICATIONS SECTOR
PS Docket No. 24-161

Comments Due: June 24, 2024

The Federal Communications Commission’s Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau (PSHSB or Bureau) seeks comment on any observed impacts to communications that resulted from the May 2024 severe geomagnetic storm. On Thursday, May 9, 2024, the National Weather Service Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC) issued a severe (G4) Geomagnetic Storm Watch, forecasting a series of coronal mass ejections (CMEs) that merged with the Earth’s electromagnetic fields between May 7-11, 2024.1 On May 11, 2024, the storm reached extreme (G5) conditions, the first time this severity has been observed since 2003.2 According to the SWPC, CMEs are large expulsions of plasma and magnetic field from the Sun’s corona.3 Electromagnetic currents generated by CMEs, when merged with the Earth’s electromagnetic fields, may distort the propagation of radio frequency waves.

On May 11, 2024, the FCC High Frequency (HF) Direction Finding Center, which supports the public safety community and federal partners by locating interference to radio spectrum below 30 MHz, observed significant disturbance in the propagation of HF radio signals. This disturbance resulted in the disruption of voice and data communications passed over HF frequencies. To better understand the impacts of the geomagnetic storm on the U.S. communications sector, the Bureau is requesting information from communications service providers and the public regarding disruptions in communications between May 7 and 11, 2024, that it believes to be a result of the storm. The Bureau is encouraging commenters to provide any available evidence, particularly electromagnetic spectrum analyses, imagery, or chronological logs relating the storm’s impacts. Where possible, the Bureau asks that commenters include the description of the impacts; make and model of affected communications equipment, which could include transmitters, receivers, transceivers, switches, routers, amplifiers etc.; make, model, and type of affected antennae and their composition; frequencies affected; type and composition of cable adjoining communications equipment and the antennae, if applicable; duration of the impact; and any residual effects observed in the hours following restoration.

You can find the entire document, including footnotes and instructions on how to file a comment, at https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/DA-24-493A1.pdf. It will be interesting to see a report on this after the comments are in.

At the moment, I pretty much have my HF radio on 28.1246 MHz USB all of the time listening for QSPR and QRSS signals on the 10m band. Over the last few weeks and months, I've noticed plenty of solar noise from flares erupting on the sun.

The vast majority of these hardly move the S meter on the radio, it's just that I can hear the increase in noise level. At 16:47 UTC on the 14th of May 2024, there was a huge burst of noise and when I looked, the S meter was up at S6.

The is shown in the audio spectrum display above with time moving from right to left. The sudden onset of the solar noise can be seen as a result of the flare on the sun.

I knew that this flare was a really big enough and sure enough when I checked later, it turned out to be X8.7 solar flare and the largest one so far for the the current solar cycle.

I posted on Twitter /X that a big flare had occurred and Chris, G4IFX in England noted that he had heard the same thing on the 50 MHz band.

Larry, VO1FOG in Newfoundland got a screen capture of the solar noise while listening at 92.3 MHz  so it was certainly broadband as expected.

It also resulted in a big radio blackout on the HF bands. The question now is if this will result in a big aurora in the next day or two? We'll have to wait and see.

The good news about this point in the sunspot cycle is that the sun is more active, meaning that in general, band conditions are pretty good. Except when they’re not.

According to the NOAA:

There are several types of space weather that can impact HF radio communication. In a typical sequence of space weather storms, the first impacts are felt during the solar flare itself. The solar x-rays from the sun penetrate to the bottom of the ionosphere (to around 80 km). There the x-ray photons ionize the atmosphere and create an enhancement of the D layer of the ionosphere. This enhanced D-layer acts both as a reflector of radio waves at some frequencies and an absorber of waves at other frequencies. The Radio Blackout associated with solar flares occurs on the dayside region of Earth and is most intense when the sun is directly overhead.

This seems to be happening frequently in the last week or so. You can go to the NOAA site or SolarHam to learn more than you probably want to know about this.

Radio blackouts are no fun, but they’re especially disappointing if you’ve hauled your gear out for a POTA activation. I went up to the Island Lake Recreation Area (US-3315) on Saturday afternoon and fought the conditions for a while. I was also competing for calls from the Indiana, New England, and 7th Call Area QSO parties.

I started out on 20 meters, but after making only five contacts, I decided to try 17 meters, where I was able to scratch out a couple more.  I then tried 15 meters, but had absolutely non success there, so I went back to 20 meters.

By hunting around for some park-to-park contacts, I was able to make 20 contacts overall, but it took me two and a half hours to do it. I’m not sure if the conditions or the contest competition was the main culprit, but activating on a big contest weekend was probably not the smartest thing to do.

Activating the AACME

Conditions weren’t all that much better Sunday morning, when three of us—Joe AC8ES, James AE8JF, and yours truly—set up to demo amateur radio at the Ann Arbor Creativity and Making Expo (AACME).  Joe had brought his Xiegu G90 and Alex Loop, but we were barely able to hear anything.

We attributed this to two factors. First, we were trying to operate the loop inside the building. Second, there had been reports of solar flares that morning that were adversely affecting HF propagation.

Despite that, we had a great time. Joe had brought his latest project—a QRP dummy load/wattmeter—that’s going to be our club’s next build project. And, I brought various keys and code oscillators to demonstrate Morse Code and get kids (and adults) to send their names in Morse Code.

A little after 1 pm, I decided to set up my KX-3 and see what I could do with it. Before the event started, I had set up my 66-ft. doublet in the courtyard just outside where our table was located. Over the next hour and a half, I managed to scratch out eight contacts, all on 20 meters, and all with participants in the New England QSO Party.

Overall, I think our participation in the AACME was a success. We were able to spread the word about amateur radio and our club. I passed out some flyers for my June 1 Tech class, and met some other interesting people.