On Tue, 22 Mar 2011 09:15:52 -0700 (PDT), bpnjensen
wrote:

...last night reception here in California was odd. A rising K-index
apparently resulted in lots of noise and very squirrely propagation,
like the ionosphere was randomly red hot and ice cold. For the most
part, the lower bands were totally NG - 60/75/90 all were nearly dead
through 0700z. 41 and 49 were not much better, with only the
strongest big boys punching through, and even then not very strongly.
Despite the SFI up to 105, Most stations were a couple S-units below
their usual levels, with a few minor exceptions on 25m and 31m.

The exception was R. Educacion in Mexico City, 6185 khz. Usually a
difficult station here, with low modulation and battered by the big
relays on either side of it, last night it outshone them all, with a
20 over S-9 signal, crystal clear fidelity and magnificent
steadiness. I have a hard time believing it was propagation alone
that did this - but unless they suddenly found a 100-kW transmitter
lying around, I'm not sure how they managed this signal.

Things are getting interesting :-)

15 meters was hot in the mid-afternoon yesterday (1800UTC). I
contacted a 40 watt SSB Algerian station with 100 watts. 59 report
both ways. And I got a 59+10dB report out of Croatia also with 100
watts SSB.

Jim(MI)