AM DX'ing before or after a thunderstorm?

[nocomradio]

Just curious what others' experience has been here with the MW band when DX'ing in thunderstorm season?

Any extraordinary catches before or after a storm moves through? Any difference at all? Normal?

Seems that here in Central VA, I sometimes have some better catches right after a storm passes late in the evening/early morning. Not always consistent, though.

 

[spunker88]

All of the interference from lightning discharge usually turns me away from AM during thunderstorms. Plus up here we usually only get thunderstorms during the summer and I'm focused on FM e-skip during that time.

 

[ddsparxx]

I once heard WSTW up in Delaware in northern VA (Fairfax Co. actually) in an early evening right after a line of thunderstorms, many years ago, with a car radio with adequate selectivity, along with some local 93.9 splatter. This was way before the HD radio.

 

[ddsparxx]

Oops, I didn't read the title of the thread correctly. But I do point out that it could also bring in FM DX.

 

[nocomradio]

No problem on FM. Actually that is kind of interesting too. After a big front moves through the area, I can generally pick up WESR 103.3 off the Eastern Shore. That is my sort of yardstick for what DX'ing AM or FM will be. That station is a good couple hundred miles from me too and if my little Grundig G3 can pull it in with its built in antenna there must be some good atmospheric conditions.

 

[rbrucecarter5]

AM is usually obliterated any time a major thunderstorm is within 100 miles due to lightning crackle. FM, however, is a different matter. I remember that in Florida, with seabreeze fronts - when the atmosphere settled a couple of hours after dark the FM band came alive. Stations from all over the peninsula would come through in central Florida. Since sea breeze fronts are a regular event, FM DX was often and good.

 

[Schroedingers Cat]

I was driving down I-75 through eastern Michigan during a thunderstorm and was able to hear, through the racket, well before critical hours, 1430 and 1540 fron Toronto, and some other closer stations well beyond where I ususally can hear them. There is some kind of reflecting phenomenon that may connect the D or E layer with the troposhere. Convection between layers may be slow or nonexistent, but electric and magnetic fields travel at light speed. Those fields can clearly influence other layers of the atmosphere, though it is not well understood.

 

[nocomradio]

Last night and very early this morning (1:00AM) there were some thunderstorms moving approximately 40 or so miles South of my location. No real effect on the bands other than AM having some crackle as the lightning strikes happened. It only seems to change the conditions here if the storm moves right over us or just to the North. I do have a fairly large, lone mountain to my West that has an effect on the weather and depending on how close to it you get, both radio and cell phone reception.