Geminid Meteor Shower Peaks This Week

wonder if the meteors go through clouds???? haven't seen any in many years.

 

Cloudy in the East, nothing to see but lots to hear and how cool it is to listen to an audible representation of the meteors flying overhead and bouncing signals off of the trails. Nothing static (y) about it. If you like meteors check out the PA meteor from Dec. 2nd I caught on security cam from my QTH. https://www.qrz.com/db/K2SDS

 

Yep.
I only have a 3 ele and 100 watts on 6M.
Broke my 1,000 mile barrier last night into Colorado, 1,200 miles.
MS was crazy last night; I've not seen that much action all year.

 

Meteor scatter activity seems not as organized on 10m (yet) as on 6 & 2. I would monitor 28.400 MHz and when motivated call random CQ's in typical MS scatter op fashion with top of minute 15s on/off sequences. Self-spot yourself on the DX Cluster as looking for MS QSO's on that frequency.

Perhaps others have better suggestions?

 

We had ONE meteor here. At least that I saw.

 

Very nice BOLIDE vid!

 

Listen in on the HF AM "windows" like 1880-1950, 3870-90 or 7290 khz. Or if you're lucky there is even some occasional less noisy activity on 29300 or 50400 khz too. Less fast break, plenty of locked down PTT monologues.

But don't expect to join in much running only QRP (except on 10 / 6m). Anything that works is fine, most modern equipment still has AM mode (SDR's sound great!) and then there is older tube era ham stuff, but consider rescuing a surplus AM broadcast band xmtr and convert it! There is an increasing supply being sold off for near scrap value. Real "Hevi Metal" rigs ie, ship anchor worthy

A lotta local monologuing on 2m simplex channels too; no pesky repeater timeouts and hassles.

 

GREAT shower here last night. I stayed up way to late but managed a new state (North Dakota) and 5 new grids on 6 for the efforts. It should be noted that you can work MS any time day or night but there are a growing number of hardcore MS ops on most mornings with a weekly flurry of activity Saturday morning when bigger numbers of non retired guys are around their radios. I never tried anything but CW and occasional SSB on HF until the last few years when I decided to try absolutely everything that can be done in ham radio. After dabbling with digital modes, I tried some MS and haven't been able to stop since. It's kind of addicting. I have worked 40+ new grids in the last year on 6m MS alone with a 5el LFA Yagi and 100w. I did not expect to enjoy it as much as I do. Give it a try you might like it!

 

I saw none. I did have some luck on webSDR.org, it was cool to see scatter signals show up on the waterfall. Heck maybe tonight I'll go out and try sending!

So far as finding some joy on 10m, I second the "make lots of noise and spot yourself" option. So long as you're not stepping on someone else's toes, you can call cq til your face turns blue!

 

Was cloudy here:-(

 

Here is a video Of the Asteroid 3200 Phaethon, the Parent body that creates the Geminid shower. I made this with a 14" SCT and a Canon DSLR It's about 30 minutes compressed to 10 seonds

Also a 3 minute exposure of the same rock.

 

I captured six meteors with my Sony a7 and Rokinon 24mm f/1.4 lens. Not too bad for an urban residential location, what with all the light pollution.

 

Sounds like the norm on 40m and 30m CW lately!!!!! -aa3ej

 

Unfortunately 10m lapses into this nearly unused state in the nadir of every solar cycle. However, it's often not quite as "dead", propagation-wise, as it seems, just mostly unoccupied. At times like this it mimics 6m where most are hanging out.

So I feel your pain trying to drum up some 10m MS bidness, UNLESS there is an OTA event going on that will motivate and draw in customers. The ARRL 10m contest last weekend did, and I am sure a fair share of Q's put into those logs were accomplished via meteor scatter.

In a few days the year-long ARRL Int'l Grid Chase shebang will blast off. I read it will be scored not just by grids worked, but by band and mode as well. This could create quite a demand on 10m, as many may choose to participate solely on that band, or be seeking to maximize their results across all bands.

Working grids close in on 10m can be problematic because ground wave is short and even if ionospheric prop occurs, like E-skip, it often creates a "dead zone" within the nearby region. MS provides a method that can solve that. So perhaps the band will repopulate with "grid chasers" soon ...

 

The rest were Vegetarian?