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During the second day of the DX-pedition we had a strong M 5.7 flare plus several smaller C-flares. Fortunately it seems that no CMEs happened. The first night of AIH40 started under the minimal opening to Brasil. Later MW band suprisingly opened quickly to North America at 0100 and then again at 0430 UTC (the peak). Latter opening was very interesting with the MidWest/Rocky Mountain-stations. The most interesting ones were 570 KNRS Salt Lake City and 920 KVEL Vernal, both from Utah. Even bigger suprise was Mexico-opening at 0430 UTC. So far we have found 990 XET, 1220 XEB, 1470 XEHI and 1570 XERF from our hard disk.

Unfortunately the morning was poor. USA gone and we didn’t find any stations from CA/SA. Then in the late morning band opened earlier to East than at day one. Japan was very strong, then later China. We have not checked much of those files yet, but the station of the day was 801 KTWG Agana giving the new MW country on Mediumwaves to the both of us. KTWG peaked around 1140 UTC. Later propagation went down and Iran&India was dominating the band. The best catches so far are 1494 IRIB R Khorasan-e Razavi, 1458 IRIB R Khorasan-e Jonubi, Gayen, 981 AIR Raipur adn 1143 AIR Rohtak. But as said, mostly the files are still uninvestigated. Late part of Day 2 had quiet bad propagation. Hopefully they will improve during the day 3.

Menu and beer of the day: pasta with tomate sauce and beef&pork, Dugges Blåbärliner.

Patrik, OH6GDX

Me and Patrik travelled from Vasa to Aihkiniemi in Inari by car. We had to travel almost 950 km and it took some 12 hours with few stops on the way. We arrived just in time to check propagation on Saturday morning at 0800z, the first “TOH” after sunrise. We had some techinical problems at the start but finally got 4 stations up and running. Weather started very cold: -26 C but it warmed up and we finished day with temperature around -7C.

Two M flares during the day one is not promising start and pedition started with very few signals on Mediumwaves. Finally at 1300 UTC the band opened to Alaska. So far we have found 590 KHAR, 630 KIAM, 650 KENI, 680 KBRW, 700 KBYR, 750 KFQD, 780 KNOM, 920 KSRM and 970 KFBX IDs from the hard disks. We also heard eg. 550 giving ESPN announcements. Around this time band opened breafly also to Japan but then it changed to China and Korea. Almost every channel had one or more stations from CHN/TWN/KOR with good signal strengths. It takes lots of time to solve all of them. Later Iran started come in loud and band went to all Arabic.

Menu and beer of the day: macaroni casserole and CREW Republic Detox.

Aihkiniemi, Partakko, Inari 15.11.2014

Me (TIK, OH1NOA) and Patrik (PW, OH6GDX) will be at Aihkiniemi DX Cabin between the 15th and 22nd of November. Our plan is to arrive early Saturday morning to Aihkiniemi and leave the site 7 nights later. We will be equipped with the regular 13 antennas of Aihkiniemi + one extra antenna pointing to Gibraltar. We will have several Perseus SDR receivers with us, our plan is to record 4 directions same time. Me and Patrik are both all around listeners so we are interested in both Americas and Asia/Oceania and everything between.

This is my first Lappland DX-pedition since 1987 MUD6-pedition to Kaamanen with Raimo Mäkelä. Patrik has once been in Lemmenjoki.

If time permits, I will report about condx on daily basis via this blog.