Party Balloon Detected!

Propagation has been a bit rubbish over the past few days, and efforts with my special call GB0BYS have been tough going, despite managing contacts on all bands from 80-10m with one day left to go.

I had an interesting email yesterday from AA7FV, based about 15 miles north of Tucson, Arizona.  The title was 'What antenna?'

Darrel, an UK ex-pat, told me of his surprise to receive a -3dB S/N report from my WSPR reception on 14MHz, using the GB0BYL call.

Darrel commented, speculating that I "must have an extraordinary antenna there to be able to give me a -3 dB s/n report"

"I have rarely - in fact I think never - had such a good report from Europe or the UK.  Other WSPR reports I was receiving from Europe or the UK at the time were typically 20 dB weaker than that."

Darrel  knows what he's talking about.  He's a semi-retired professional astronomer with a Physics Ph.D. from Cambridge University.  Even better than his academic qualifications is his rhombic antenna pointing at Europe.  A rhombic like this has a typical gain in excess of 15dBi on its main, very narrow front and rear lobes.

Even with my standard vertical delta loop as the antenna for 14MHz, I've managed contacts - either TX or RX - when others are unable to, over a long period of time and I've blogged about them regularly.  Others tend to think this is machoistic bravado, but I see it only as reporting what happens from a clear, elevated, highly mineralised site overlooking the sea.  Magic and bravado aren't necessary.  The environment and consequent antenna pattern (i.e. extremely low, even sub-horizontal radiation) is what makes it all happen.

To reinforce the great potential of my QTH, I happened to pick up the tiny 10mW from ZL1RS' BB05 balloon, and making its way eastwards across the Pacific, lying close to Easter Island at the time.

Now tell me the QTH isn't a good radio site!

The critical thing is that, at the time of consulting the WSPR database (evening of 27/04/2018), I was one of only two stations across Europe, Africa and Asia (one station from JA) that had heard from the balloon since its launch, 3 days earlier.  Curiously, ZL1RS says that the transmitter is 50mW, whereas the WSPR reception reports issued by all stations claimed 10mW.  Either way, it's a long way for a tiny signal, even from 30,000 feet and a full vertical dipole dangling underneath the balloon!

So, I think I am now content, faced with all this entirely non-biased, human-free WSPR assessment, that this QTH is very special for radio, and that it yields world-beating performance from simple (but always well-made and matched) wire antennas.