Well that was an experience not to be repeated, I hope.  Conditions the wrong side of awful, and perhaps as a result, I sense lower activity from some parts of the world. The K index was between 4 and 6, slowly dropping during the contest. A was high and a number of VE’s (and G’s !) had a distinct auroral ring. 

 

It all started quite well, but then the number of stations began to dry up, and by the time we were in the early hours, sleep beckoned (I took a one hour micro-nap to relieve the monotony). The long haul routes were quite hard work – 3D2 was ESP with me – and LF did not really deliver. For me, no ZL on 80m and no VE7, although a few VK2 and 6 stations.  Nigel and Ian in 3B8 were very active, as was Andy in 5Z4, all with good signals.  Don in 5X did not seem to be hearing particularly well, but the Caribbean gang were all very good signals.  

 

Score seems to be 80% of last year, and QSO count is  75% of last year, all subject to checking.  Not sure that the scoring is correct (last year my logger calculated a score some 20% below the correct one!), but this is what WT shows:

 

BAND   QSO DUP DXC  HQ  POINTS BONUS   AVG 

——————————————–

   80    41   0  14   9     375   620 24.27 

   40    87   3  25  12     835  1260 24.08 

   20   114   2  32  15    1105  1480 22.68 

   15    48   1  23  10     440   920 28.33 

   10    17   0  10   4     140   320 27.06 

——————————————–

TOTAL   307   6 104  50    2895  4600 24.41 

============================================

            TOTAL SCORE : 7 495

 

Thanks for all the Q’s and a special thanks to all the travellers who make the contest such great fun.  Let’s hope the sun gods give us a better deal next year.

 

Usual station – SO2R with twin FTDX 101s/linears, three yagis and LF vertical, beverages and K9AY

 

73, Don

 

Don Beattie G3BJ / G5W