Wednesday December 23, 3.30am local time and I can’t sleep. That’s what I get from sleeping under the roof when it’s half a storm: I actually don’t sleep. Too much noises from rattling window shutters and the utility cables (3x 400V and one TV coax) from the pole across the street to the side of the house is bumping against the roof tiles. It’s perpendicular to the wind so it swings, hence it hits the side of the roof all the time.
It has been a very windy few weeks. AGAIN. Temperature records are smashed one after the other and I dug up my shorts. Two days before Christmas and we hit 14°C again yesterday. Along with the everlasting wind and strong gusts. I know I am repeating myself. But that’s because for the third time in a row we get a warm windy season that is marked winter on the calendar but is more of a late fall or early spring. I saw a butterfly just the other week.
Here’s how I know I repeat myself:
and here:
Look for 9ACW in there and you’ll see I didn’t do it because strong winds prevented me from cranking up the tower. This year I badly needed a shot of CW contesting after missing LZDX and WWCW mainly because of this too. I read the WW CW comments on 3830 and from G over DL to OZ/OH, everyone was mentioning the wind or storm. Either they got damaged antennas or had to lower crank up towers to prevent it.
This year the wind was supposed to be less the weekend of the 9A CW contest. Just for the weekend. So I decided to skip 160m and crank the tower up only one level. Just for fun, nothing serious, but actually made a few contest QSO.
And that’s what I did. I made 770 QSO. I did sleep. Even more than planned. Propagation was only so-so. Ten meter is a goner. Especially with A/K indexes that were pretty high with a peak during the contest. And participation seemed down overall. I’ve had more fun in this one.
After the contest I took down the tower and the 80m wire (and the new 30m antennas – plural, more on that in another episode). Because, you guessed it, Monday would be very windy. And it was. Tuesday would bring even more wind and stronger gusts. And it did. And it worsened during the night. Which is right now. And that’s why I find myself typing this instead of sleeping and dreaming…
Better luck next time?
2 replies on “9ACW 2015”
Temperatures are supposed to reach 21C here on Christmas Eve, with wind gusts similar to yours. I think if you multiply average Solar Flux number times the average temperature, you will find a constant value these days!
The weather was so nice this past weekend I didn’t spend much time indoors, but I think I did give you a token 9ACW QSO during a short period of spinning the knob and looking for 9A stations – didn’t hear many. Did the same thing on Saturday – propagation was much more fitting for the VE RAC contest – the A index could reach triple digits and can still work VEs here.
73/MX/HNY – John K3TN
Hi John
Thanks for the reply and the Q on 20 last weekend. Yes indeed: not too many 9A’s around.
We just went out for a walk. WX wouldn’t be bad for the end of March or half October. Thermometer says around 12°C. TWELVE – Christmas in two days, northern hemisphere. The wind has settled for now, which is relative as it blows still harder than average. Bearing has been S/W all the time, which is statistically the direction it comes from most of the time. On the few occasions that WX comes from the East, it brings dry weather that is stone cold in winter or just below hot in summer. But it has been S/W since somewhere in Ocotber and still no sign of any change.
I wonder if I will need to change my summer tires to my set of winter tires this year???
73 / CU soon