I just read the ARRL news this morning and this looks great for this coming weekend. Coming this Saturday there is going to be a great propagation event for those of us on 2 meters who haven’t upgraded to our General yet, or just for those who are interested in making some new contacts.
The information about the shower can be found in several places but the need to know information is below. For a more detailed study of the meteor shower please see the links at the bottom of this post.
The information is posted here in reference to the 2 meter band, but it should provide some good propagation for some of the HF bands as well, I am just not as familar with the HF bands yet.
- Date – Saturday, September 1st, 2007
- Time – Peak 1137 UTC (+/- 20 minutes), which is 06:37 CT in the U.S.
- Frequency – 144.200 mhz for those using 2 meters (can spread out from there depending on results)
- Meteor Scatter – from Comet C/1911 N1 (Kiess)
This will be the first time I will try to make some contacts via a meteor scatter, so I hope to make some great “2 meter” dx contacts, if there is such a thing. Although it will not be visible from the east coast, we still should be able to take advantage of the propagation at the time (if it materializes).
This very rare shower will occur again on 1 September 2007. A brief shower of tens of meteors will radiate from the constellation of Auriga, many as bright as the brighter stars in the sky. The Earth will be in the thick of it during the one hour centered on 04:33 a.m. PDT. The shower will be visible by the naked eye from locations in the western United States, including Hawaii and Alaska, from Mexico, and from the western provinces of Canada. [Ames Research Center]
I would love to hear from anyone that makes any contacts on Saturday morning, I will be on the air around 1100 UTC (or 06:00 CDT) on 144.200 mhz. Good luck to everyone. 73, KI4WLR
Links of interest for the meteor scatter:
- http://leonid.arc.nasa.gov/aurigids.html
- http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2007/08aug_aurigids.htm
- http://aurigids.seti.org/
- http://www.arrl.org/?artid=7688 (ARRL article on comet)
- http://www.space.com/spacewatch/070817_ns_aurigid_meteors.html
- http://www.qsl.net/ve6bpr/page5.htm (meteor scatter contact info)
- http://spaceweather.com/ (always good info all around)
