Radio Propagation Conditions - Some images may fail to load, this is not a fault of the web page. Try a refresh first. Refreshing this page will also update some of the images shown as some images are updated every few minutes on the central server.
Current DX Activity on Amateur Radio Bands
Please allow several seconds for the bar chart to display. Data is occasionally unavailable.
The bar chart at the left is based on the last 250 DX spotting's reported to the OH2AQ web cluster. Bar lengths are proportional to the quantity of reports received for each band. The total number of reports for each band is noted in magenta at the end of each bar.
The last spotting posted to the cluster is noted in blue at the bottom of the graph. The average spot/minute indicator is a moving average based on the 25 last reports.
Gray-line Importance to Propagation
Special ionospheric propagation conditions often exist between two or more stations simultaneously located on the gray-line transition between daylight and darkness. The current gray-line position is depicted on this topographical world map. (Allow a few seconds for current-position calculations, image creation, and image loading.)
This statistical plot provides an estimate of the location, intensity and extent of current northern hemisphere aurora by indicating the likelihood that the aurora is near geographic locations in the northern hemisphere. The estimates are based upon measured power flux conditions that existed during the most recent north polar NOAA POES satellite pass.
Estimated power fluxes in the plot are color-coded in steps from 0 to 10 ergs.cm-2.sec-1 according to the color-bar legend displayed on the right.
The red arrow in the plot points in direction of the noon meridian at the time the image was created.
Updated images are are produced every ten minutes to adjust for earth rotation. Click your web browser refresh or reload button to display the most recent plot.
This statistical plot provides an estimate of the location, intensity and extent of current southern hemisphere aurora by indicating the likelihood that the aurora is near geographic locations in the southern hemisphere. The estimates are based upon measured power flux conditions that existed during the most recent south polar NOAA POES satellite pass.
Estimated power fluxes in the plot are color-coded in steps from 0 to 10 ergs.cm-2.sec-1 according to the color-bar legend displayed on the right.
The red arrow in the plot points in direction of the noon meridian at the time the image was created.
Updated images are are produced every ten minutes to adjust for earth rotation. Click your web browser refresh or reload button to display the most recent plot.
The Current Sunspot Cycle
The current solar cycle is expected to reach a low turning-point in 2007. It is never possible to know the exact time of a solar cycle turning-point until after it has occurred. However, there has been very little solar activity in recent weeks and sunspot numbers are tracking close to predicted values, so a low turning-point in 2007 appears likely.
Two Sunspot Cycle Predictions
Solar physicists believe the speed of a massive circulating current of hot plasma within the Sun predicts the amplitudes of sunspot cycles approximately twenty years into the future. In recent years that speed has become lower than ever before observed. Based on the plasma-speed/future-cycle-amplitude theory, a team led by physicist Mausumi Dikpata of the National Center for Atmospheric Research predicts Cycle 24 will be intense. NASA solar physicist David Hathaway agrees, but predicts Cycle 25 will be extraordinarily weak. Dikpati's team prediction for Cycle 24 is shown above in pink. Hathaway's Cycle 24 and 25 predictions are shown in red.
Past sunspot cycles up to the spring of 2006 are shown in black.
The two future sunspot cycle predictions are shown in red and pink.
