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'Tis The Season...

D

DeadElvis

As is expected in April, tropospheric ducting has been massive along the Coast the past few days. Signals from outside have been strong and paths have been long, indeed. I read, for instance, that the PRM tranmitter in Bude was overwhelming the NPR station in Brownsville, TX.

Have any stations been particularly impacted? Sometimes the interference can be nasty.

DE
 
I have my television set to tune 2-69 without having to use the channel scan. A few night ago I was getting a bunch of HDTV from Dallas. Shreveport and Tyler, TX that was coming in gangbusters for several hours. On the radio, it seemed to shift to stations from the south a day or two later. I was getting powerful signals from 92.3 Laplace. WRNO and WNOE FM from New Orleans and several others. Several of the weaker Jackson stations were obliterated by the DX.
 
I didn't realize that ducting could adversely affect stations all the way up in Jackson. I figured it was mostly a coastal thing.

I'm on the AL coast, so not far from Mississippi. A few days ago Houston and Tallahassee were booming in, along with Albany, GA for some reason. Then, the night before last, it switched to Birmingham, Montgomery and Jackson. I was happy to hear WYMX from Greenwood crystal clear for a few minutes, since I used to live up that way. Miss 103 out of Jackson has been underneath local WXBM (on 102.7) pretty much every night for the last several nights.

Dunno about the coastal MS stations but none of the locals here have really been aversely impacted. Since I'm between Mobile and Pensacola I usually lose the lower powered stations but never the close-by 100 kW C's that broadcast from just up the road a piece.
 
Oh, yes... this Springtime propagation does move inland. Jackson is far from insulated.

The further north you go, of course, the less common it is. Here in Memphis, I'll get a few days of tropo from these air masses per year. Jackson gets much more. Still, there have been mornings during which I could leisurely listen to Houston, New Orleans or Mobile/Pensacola (104.1 is particularly common here) on FM just driving around town. When the band really pops, I'll work 2 meter ham (144 MHz) deep into Florida or Texas.

If you're in Baldwin County, you're right in the thick of it. When I was a kid in beautiful Pascagoula, I would often see TV from Tampa, Sarasota, or even Naples for DAYS at a time. That's amazing stuff.

BTW: Spacing between TV stations is slightly different on the Gulf Coast for this reason. It doesn't help much, though.

DE
 
That's pretty cool. I lived in Grenada for four years and don't remember but a couple of good DX events.

I figured TV DX would be a thing of the past with the digital switchover, but I see a post in the DX forum where a guy down around Tampa just logged a station from ~1000 miles away during our last tropo event, so maybe there's hope yet. I'm lucky if I can get WALA-DT reliably and I can see their tower from the other side of the neighborhood. ;)
 
Sure. There are lots of possibilities down there. You're in one of the best spots IN THE WORLD.

Here is one if my favorites from Pascagoula. Shot in the 80s, this is tropo on channel 11 from Cuba. Again, Gulf tropo is mighty cool.

http://twitpic.com/3bxnew

You have a nice clear shot to Mexico, too. It would pop in from time-to-time.

DE
 
I picked up Z106.7 from Jackson in front of the Beau Rivage last summer. I thought it was 106.7 from New Orleans until it came out from commercial break. I'm also able to pick up 620 from Tampa on a regular basis on the coast.
 
AM signals are not subject to tropospheric bending. The presence of 620 AM along the northern gulf coast is the result of the ground conductivity over salt water, which far exceeds the most ideal soil conductivity anywhere. The coverage of that AM, and others along the coast, is a constant, and not related to the presence or absence of tropo, which is also known as a temperature inversion layer.
 
Yes. The difference is conductivity between land and sea water cannot be overstated.

Ground conductivity along the mid Gulf Coast, e.g., Mobile, is famously bad. If you look at the FCC maps (which are a bit tough to read on the Internet), it's rated between 1 and 3. Sea water is 500. Yes, 500. If you are ever curious for a real-world illustration, go the the beach and find an AM signal coming over the water -- perhaps a Cuban or deep Floridian. Then, drive inland. You'll notice the signal dropping quickly just a mile or two from the beach.

Next time I am down there, maybe I'll pay a bit more attention to what's on AM. I'm going to kayak to Horn Island in the Fall -- maybe then. But I'll have some ham gear; space may be limited.

DE
 
While driving along US 90 you can pick up stations from South Lousianna, such as Fort Sulpher, fairly clear and some of those stations are only 1000 watts or so. But some of the local Gulfport/Biloxi stations barely make it out of the city up highway 49. 690 AM Jacksonville and several other stations along the Atlantic coast come in like a local in North Carolina when you are on the beach.
 
flytrap, are you thinking of KAGY from Port Sulphur, on 1510? 1,000 watts, daytime only, but they really come in strong along the coast. I sat in the car and listened to them all the way up in Foley, AL (about 15 miles inland) the other day and it was perfectly clear. I was surprised at how solid it was for being such a small station.

Since we've drifted to AM talk for a moment, I'd be curious to know if anyone along the MS coast can log a new signal: WINK 1200 from Cape Coral, Florida. They just switched over to a 50 kW setup that throws a decent lobe NNW towards Tallahassee. I had no trouble with them here in AL well inland from the beach, but there was some noise from 1190 WMEJ in Bay St Louis. I'd be curious if anyone could null out that station and pick up WINK.
 
While driving between Amarillo TX and Tucumcari NM two summers ago, I picked up B98.5, Star-94, Dave-FM and KICKS-101.5 from Atlanta. It lasted for more than an hour and then it was gone.
 
lfuss said:
While driving between Amarillo TX and Tucumcari NM two summers ago, I picked up B98.5, Star-94, Dave-FM and KICKS-101.5 from Atlanta. It lasted for more than an hour and then it was gone.
Click to expand...

That was quite a lucky catch. As impressive as the DX was, if you could hear what's normally audible there you'd be thankful to have more choices. It's a pretty sparse dial between Amarillo and Albuquerque.
 
I had a very similar experience...

It was quite some time ago. In fact, it was the day that Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990. Driving through the wide open spaces between Lubbock and Albuquerque, in came KGON/Portland on 92.3. There were one or two other stations, but I can't recall whom now.

There were some stretches without really anything on FM.

DE
 
Zach said:
lfuss said:
While driving between Amarillo TX and Tucumcari NM two summers ago, I picked up B98.5, Star-94, Dave-FM and KICKS-101.5 from Atlanta. It lasted for more than an hour and then it was gone.
Click to expand...

That was quite a lucky catch. As impressive as the DX was, if you could hear what's normally audible there you'd be thankful to have more choices. It's a pretty sparse dial between Amarillo and Albuquerque.
Click to expand...

About ten years ago while living in Atlanta, I picked up an FM rock station from Kansas.
 
In the summer of 1980 I was in Vicksburg, MS during one of the hottest summers on record. During that month-plus period I was able to get Dallas-Fort Worth stations on a regular basis, including KPLX, KVIL, & KFJZ-FM (Z-97). Then in the early '80s I'll never forget living in Southwest Mississippi and picking up WCBS-FM (101.1) & WYNY (97.1) from New York!
 
Back in the 70's I briefly picked up a station playing all disco from Albuquerque, NM. I was floored. Not that I was picking up a station from New Mexico, but the fact I was hearing DISCO on FM! Sacriledge! All we had in Jackson on FM in the 70's was album rock, easy listening, urban and religion/christian. we had a small AC station in Clinton (WHJT) and when the weather was right you could get WKYV 106.7 out of Vicksburg which was country (Country on FM was also rather rare back then) at least around these parts.
 
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