‰ Now 18 WPM transition file follows ‰

winners have been announced in contested arrl director and vice
director races.  bill edgar, n3llr, will take over as atlantic
division director from bernie fuller, n3efn, who did not seek
another term.  succeeding edgar as atlantic division vice director
will be arrl Maryland dc section manager tom abernethy, w3tom.
elsewhere, great lakes division director jim weaver, k8je, and
midwest division director wade walstrom, w0ej, overcame challenges
to win new three year terms.  gary johnston, ki4la, will be the next
great lakes vice director, succeeding dick mondro, w8fqt, who was
not a candidate. Just last week we saw no sunspots. Then on November
13 we saw sunspot 822 peek around the eastern side of the visible
solar disk.  By November 15 we could see that it is a big one.
Today, November 18, the spot should be squarely facing earth. The
daily sunspot number rose from 26 on Monday, November 14, to 32, 58
and 62 on November 17. Daily solar flux is based on the 2R8 GHz
energy received from the sun at an observatory in Penticton, British
Columbia, Canada at local noon, which is 2000z. For the past two
days, November 16 and 17, the three daily readings were 93R2, 94,
96, 97R1, 100R5 and 103R2. The 94 and 100R5 readings taken at local
noon each day were the official solar flux numbers for those days.
You can see the trend is up. Currently as this is written early
Friday, November 18, the interplanetary magnetic field is pointing
south, which means the earth is vulnerable to any flares from
sunspot 822. Most interesting this week was an email from Martin of
Stillwater, Oklahoma. Martin was amazed on the morning of November
14 at 0200 CST local time, or 0800z, to record the KQ2H repeater
system in New York on 29R62 MHz FM. The repeater faded out, then
began coming in again around 0530 local time with New York drive
time traffic, probably from its 2 meter link. By 0600 CST it was
full quieting. He tuned around the rest of 10 meters and the 11
meter band, and heard no other activity, except the tail end of an
FM signal briefly on 29R64 MHz. Note that all this activity was over
night, for most of the time dark at both ends of the path. Sunspot
numbers were 0, 0, 11, 16, 26, 32 and 58 with a mean of 20R4. 10R7
cm flux was 77R9, 78R6, 83R1, 87R8, 92R4, 100, and 94, with a mean
of 87R7. Estimated planetary A indices were 2, 5, 10, 14, 10, 4 and
3 with a mean of 6R9. Estimated mid latitude A indices were 1, 3, 7,
12, 7, 5 and 1, with a mean of 5R1‚

‰ End of 18 WPM transition file ‰