On Thu, 2 Aug 2012, wrote:

On Thu, 2 Aug 2012 12:43:54 -0700 (PDT), Beloved Leader
wrote:

On Thursday, August 2, 2012 3:24:52 PM UTC-4, (unknown) wrote:
http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/rt_plots/kp_3d.html Kp=5 Jim (MI)

Using binoculars, I saw a huge sunspot at sunrise this morning, which for me was right after 6:00 a.m. outside Washington, DC. It looked like the transit of Venus. Really, it was that large and noticeable.

The atmosphere was so humidity-laden that I could look at the sun through the binoculars without any needing any glass from a welder's mask. YMMV.

Do you remember the giant sunspots during the 1960's you could see
with the naked eye? Solar flux over 200. I used to pick up WWV on 25
MHz on my cheap walkie-talkies. New Zealand used to blast in around
midnight local time just below 18 MHz. Good times.

I'm surprised you could hear 25MHz WWV on a cheap walkie talkie. Surely
band conditions opened up that you'd get all the CBers first, so they'd
wipe out WWV. The superregenerative receivers were wide band, but the
CBers were a lot more plentiful.

I remember when I got my first shortwave receiver in 1971, I'd tune up and
down the CB band, and when conditions were good, it was one big squeal,
all the heterodynes and just solid signal from all the stations packed
into such a small space, and conditions good so even 3.5watts out would
come booming in from elsewhere.

Michael