AIH78 – Aihkiniemi DX-pedition Day 1
Day 1 late Thursday – late Friday 8.-9.12.2017
Finally on DX-pedition! Our 4th DX-pedition started this year a bit earlier than before as the 6th of December was the 100th anniversary of Finland and day off. Timo moved to Vaasa already on Wednesday evening. Our trip started on Thursday morning at 07:30am. We stopped in Kempele to buy the most of our food and then in Rovaniemi for a pizza break. We were excited to hear that Inari Väylä (only some 20 km from our QTH) was the coldest place in Finland, about -35C in the morning.
We arrived to Aihkiniemi around 22:30 – after 15 hours of drive. When we approached the place, weather changed a bit warmer and it was only -24C when we arrived (it went up to -9C next day). We were very lucky and the final path to listening cottage had so little snow that we could drive our Skoda directly to the front of cottage. After some unpacking we were ready for the rocknroll.
Earlier in the weak propagation was dominated by a coronal hole which made radio propagation more or less disturbed. It continued till Thursday. We were lucky as the effect of coronal hole started to vanish little by little during the first day. Propagation was up and down and it wasn’t really really juicy to any part of the world but on the other hand mediumwaves were open to almost everywhere.
The first night started with La Plata stations which picked up at 0400z. Same time Brasilian stations continued till 07z with stations like 730 ZYH759 Rado 730 and 1050 ZYI203 Radio Capixaba. We were suprised that North America came in already at 2300z and propagation continued all night. Unfortunately stations were more or less usual suspects. In the morning at 06z we got the first new US catch 1070 KFTI Wichita KS when band was good to KS/SD/WY area. Band seemed to dive after 0715z but suprisingly it came up few hours later giving West Coast stations till 1500z! New stations so far noticed are 550 KOAC Corvallis OR and 1140 KXRB Sioux Falls SD. Same time Alaska was very strong (all common Alaska stations were heard) and even for the first time we got several new HI stations: 830 KHVH, 990 KIKI and 1040 KLHT. The real blast was 1035 Newstalk ZB at 1203z. Our first MW station from New Zealand! Other Pacific was not noticed except strong Majuro 1098. Maybe tomorrow …
During the evening we listened to earlier recordings so not so much to tell about Asian propagation so far. DWNX 1611 was heard during the sign off and sign on. 891 and 1296 Aussies were also heard. We also watched some icehockey from the computer.
Daily meal: chicken in cream sauce with rice and salad
The best beer: BrewDog Pump Action Poet
