Tag Archives: Eclipse

RAC: Canadian Amateurs Invited to Participate in Solar Eclipse Project

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Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Richard, who shares the following announcement from the RAC:

Contribute to Eclipse Science and History: Research Propagation with Your Receiver!

March 5, 2024 – 

The Case Amateur Radio Club W8EDU of Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio is excited to invite Canadian Amateurs to participate in the upcoming CHU Eclipse Data Collection Project!

We will be monitoring the reception of the Canadian time standard CHU before, during, and after the eclipse to measure the recombination time of the ionosphere. In other words, we know that the ionosphere changes in response to the presence of UV radiation in the sun by ionizing during the day and ‘de-ionizing’ at night (which is why many frequency bands propagate differently during the day and the night).

We understand how the ionosphere changes over a normal 24-hour period in response to the relatively slow transition from daytime to night time, but want to learn more about how it changes over a much shorter period (which is what the eclipse provides). We want you to help!

Our goal is to study how the eclipse affects radio wave propagation, helping us understand the ionosphere’s recombination time. To achieve this, we need your help recording Canada’s time standard station CHU for two weeks surrounding the April 8th eclipse. Anyone with a KiwiSDR or a rig capable of interfacing with analysis/recording software like Fldigi is encouraged to join the effort!

This project has already garnered enthusiastic support from various communities, including the American Radio Relay League, the Radio Amateurs of Canada, and the Ham Radio Citizen Science Investigation HamSCI.

We have over 20 stations across the continent participating, from universities and high schools to representatives from the Radio Amateurs of Canada and even a station in Mexico!

To join us and contribute valuable data, simply visit our website and follow the instructions (https://w8edu.wordpress.com/chu-eclipse-data-collection/) to set up your station and notify us about your participation.

Please reach out to [email protected] if you have any questions or comments.

Adam Goodman W7OKE, President, Case Amateur Radio Club
David Kazdan AD8Y, MD, PhD, Faculty Advisor, Case Amateur Radio Club
Chistian Zorman, PhD, Faculty Advisor, Case Amateur Radio Club, Associate Dean for Research, Case School of Engineering

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Eclipse Radio: Several NASA-Funded Science Projects

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Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, David Iurescia, who shares the following article via NASA:

The Aug. 21, 2017, total solar eclipse douses Umatilla National Forest in shadow, darkening the sky and rimming the horizon with a 360 degree sunset. Credit: NASA/Mara Johnson-Groh

NASA-Funded Science Projects Tuning In to ‘Eclipse Radio’ (NASA)

On April 8, 2024, a total solar eclipse will cross parts of the United States. For millions of people along the path of totality, where the Moon will completely cover the Sun, it may feel like an eerie daytime darkness has descended as temperatures drop and wind patterns change. But these changes are mild compared to what happens some 100 to 400 miles above our heads in an electrically conductive layer of our atmosphere known as the ionosphere, where the “false night” of an eclipse is amplified a hundredfold. Three NASA-funded experiments will investigate the eclipse’s effects on the ionosphere through the power of radio, a technology well suited to studying this enigmatic layer of our atmosphere.

Whether you’ve heard of the ionosphere or not, you’ve likely taken advantage of its existence. This electric blanket of particles is critical for long-distance AM and shortwave radio. Radio operators aim their transmitters into the sky, “bouncing” signals off this layer and around the curvature of Earth to extend their broadcast by hundreds or even thousands of miles.

The ionosphere is sustained by our Sun. The Sun’s rays separate negatively charged electrons from atoms, creating the positively charged ions that the ionosphere is named for. When night falls, over 60 miles of the ionosphere disappears as ions and electrons recombine into neutral atoms. Come dawn, the electrons are freed again and the ionosphere swells in the Sun’s illumination – a daily cycle of “breathing” in and out at a global scale.

A total solar eclipse is a scientific goldmine – a rare chance to observe a natural experiment in action. On April 8 the three NASA-funded projects listed below are among those “tuning in” to the changes wrought by a blotted-out Sun.

SuperDARN

The Super Dual Auroral Radar Network, or SuperDARN, is a collection of radars located at sites around the world. They bounce radio waves off of the ionosphere and analyze the returning signal. Their data reveals changes in the ionosphere’s density, temperature, and location (i.e. movement).

The 2024 eclipse will pass over three U.S.-based SuperDARN radars. A team of scientists led by Bharat Kunduri, a professor at the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, have been busy preparing for it.

“The changes in solar radiation that occur during a total solar eclipse can result in a ’thinning’ of the ionosphere,” Kunduri said. “During the eclipse, SuperDARN will operate in special modes designed to monitor the changes in the ionosphere at finer spatiotemporal scales.”

Kunduri’s team will compare SuperDARN’s measurements to predictions from computer models to answer questions about how the ionosphere responds to a solar eclipse.

HamSCI

While some experiments rely on massive radio telescopes, others depend more on people power. The Ham Radio Science Citizen Investigation, or HamSCI, is a NASA citizen science project that involves amateur or “ham” radio operators. On April 8, ham radio operators across the country will attempt to send and receive signals to one another before, during, and after the eclipse. Led by Nathaniel Frissell, a professor of Physics and Engineering at the University of Scranton in Pennsylvania, HamSCI participants will share their radio data to catalog how the sudden loss of sunlight during totality affects their radio signals.

This experiment follows similar efforts completed during the 2017 total solar eclipse and the 2023 annular eclipse.

“During the 2017 eclipse, we found that the ionosphere behaved very similar to nighttime,” Frissell said. Radio signals traveled farther, and frequencies that typically work best at night became usable. Frissell hopes to continue the comparison between eclipses and the day/night cycle, assessing how widespread the changes in the ionosphere are and comparing the results to computer models.

RadioJOVE

Some radio signals don’t bounce off of the ionosphere – instead, they pass right through it. Our Sun is constantly roiling with magnetic eruptions, some of which create radio bursts. These long-wavelength bursts of energy can be detected by radio receivers on Earth. But first they must pass through the ionosphere, whose ever-changing characteristics affect whether and how these signals make it to the receiver.

The RadioJOVE project is a team of citizen scientists dedicated to documenting radio signals from space, especially Jupiter. During the total solar eclipse, RadioJOVE participants will focus on the Sun. Using radio antenna kits they set up themselves, they’ll record solar radio bursts before, during, and after the eclipse.

During the 2017 eclipse, some participants recorded a reduced intensity of solar radio bursts. But more observations are needed to draw firm conclusions. “With better training and more observers, we’ll get better coverage to further study radio propagation through the ionosphere,” said Chuck Higgins, a professor at Middle Tennessee State University and founding member of RadioJOVE. “We hope to continue longer-term observations, through the Heliophysics Big Year and beyond.”

Find out more about the April 8, 2024, solar eclipse on NASA’s eclipse page.

By Miles Hatfield
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.

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HamSCI Reminder: Contribute to ionospheric research during the October 14, 2023 solar eclipse!

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Many thanks to SWling Post contributor, Nick Hall-Patch, who shares the following announcement:

How DXers can contribute to ionospheric research during the 14 October 2023 solar eclipse

There will be an annular solar eclipse on 14 October, 2023 when, at totality, the size of the Moon’s disk will appear slightly smaller than the size of the Sun’s disk.  This eclipse will affect all of North America, as well as Central and part of South America, as seen in the map below.

AM Broadcast Band DXers know that the blocking out of radiation from the sun during a total solar eclipse can introduce temporary night time listening conditions over an area far beyond the path of totality.

The upcoming annular eclipse is expected to have a similar effect on daytime medium wave listening conditions as would a total solar eclipse, and should not be missed by DXers.  Live listening can be done during the eclipse, as well as recording the entire medium wave band, using SDRs (software defined radios).

There might be more to our DXing results than new and unexpected receptions of distant radio stations, however.  The rapidly changing listening conditions will be indicating a similarly turbulent ionosphere, and DXers’ documenting those listening conditions through SDR recordings could provide information that will be useful to scientists who want to gain a better understanding of the Earth’s ionospheric dynamics.

How can DXers contribute to ionospheric research?

HamSCI is an organization of volunteer citizen-scientists and professional researchers who study upper atmospheric and space physics, and will be interested in examining MW DXers’ wideband SDR recordings made during both eclipses, and indeed, in having DXers assist with HamSCI’s research. In fact, IRCA members contributed to HamSCI’s work about the 2017 total solar eclipse by contributing their DXing results: https://hamsci.org/sites/default/files/publications/2019_am-eclipse2017_hall-patch.pdf

HamSCI is still welcoming experienced medium wave DXers who are using good quality SDRs, especially in the southeastern USA and in Latin America. Please go to https://hamsci.org/mw-recordings/ and discover how to make sure that those DX files will also qualify as scientific data that can become part of the public record.

It will be important to have many participants in this project.  To sign up, please go to https://hamsci.org/mw-recordings/ and discover how to make sure that those DX files will also qualify as scientific data that can become part of the public record.

Those interested in finding out about all the research that HamSCI will be doing during the upcoming eclipses, check out https://hamsci.org/eclipse .  Especially if you are also an amateur radio operator, there are several other ways that you might contribute to the project.

But, even if you can’t contribute to scientific research, don’t forget to get out there and DX during the eclipse. You might be surprised at what you can hear.

 

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Radio Waves: Eclipses and Radio Waves, Radio World’s Letters, Eifel Radio Days Special, and AM Radio for Every Vehicle Act

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Radio Waves:  Stories Making Waves in the World of Radio

Welcome to the SWLing Post’s Radio Waves, a collection of links to interesting stories making waves in the world of radio. Enjoy!

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributors Andrea Borgnino, Dennis Dura, ______ for the following tips:

Eclipses do odd things to radio waves. An army of amateur broadcasters wants to find out why (BBC Future)

It’s the huge tower in his back yard that gives Todd Baker’s hobby away. Bristling with antennae, the 30m (100ft) structure is taller than many of the mature trees nearby. Baker, an industrial conveyor belt salesman from Indiana, goes not just by his name, but also his call-sign, the short sequence of letters and numbers that he uses to identify himself over the air: W1TOD. He is a member of the amateur radio, or ham radio, community.

“You name it, I’ve been in it,” he says, referring to different radio systems, including citizens band, or CB radio, that he has dabbled with over the years. “Communications were just plain-o cool to me.”

Now, he dabbles in celestial citizen science, too. On 14 October, he and hundreds of other amateur radio enthusiasts will deliberately fill the airwaves during an annular solar eclipse, as it crosses the Americas. They’ll do it again next April, when a full solar eclipse becomes visible from Newfoundland to Mexico.

Why? Solar eclipses are known to affect radio transmissions, and Baker is planning to take part in a giant experiment designed to monitor how cosmic events affect radio broadcasts. [Continue reading…]

Letters: AM’s Future, Shortwave’s Past and More (Radio World)

[…]Shortwave radios don’t tell tales
Several points of interest regarding shortwave broadcasting. Although I have been retired from Voice of America as a Foreign Service Officer and field engineer for over a decade, several points are still worth noting.

In my experience of living and working around the world for 20 years, most radios sold overseas are a combination AM/FM and shortwave. So there are radios available to the general public.

Second is the beauty of shortwave. Broadcast can be sent over large distances and be highly effective at reaching the desired audience. AM broadcasting can only reach a smaller listener area and without extremely high power must be in rather close proximity to the intended audience. FM broadcasting has even greater limitations in respect to closeness to the intended listener.

As we have adopted new technology such as the global internet, we don’t seem to have a grasp of its inherent limitations. I witnessed this firsthand in the Middle East where websites or information deemed inappropriate are easily blocked or deleted from a country’s internet stream. Proxy servers and other VPN methods do little for the individuals striving for freedom of information. Information regarding using and searching for these services is easily gathered by internet service providers and can be used to intimidate or prosecute.

Shortwave radios don’t tell tales. Frequency memories can be deleted easily, and there is no way to tell what broadcast were being listened to, especially on analog scale radios.

We need to reevaluate our strategic thinking and remember that shortwave works effectively and has for many years. People around the world have relied on SW broadcast for years as a source of reliable news and information that their host countries did not want them to hear.

— Walter Konetsco

[Click here to read the entire article with other reader letters to the editor…]

Eifel Radio Days Anniversary Broadcast

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Gérard Koopal, who shares the following announcement: 

On October 29, 1923, the first “entertainment broadcast” broadcast went on air in the Vox House in Berlin. The first regular radio broadcasts began.

The Eifel Radio Days will celebrate this unique anniversary from October 27th to 30th, 2023.
Of course again live and in mono from the studio in the former alternative headquarters of the NRW state government.

facebook.com/EifelerRadiotage
twitter.com/EifelerRadioTag

https://www.eifeler-radiotage.de/[email protected]

Gérard Koopal

S. 1669, AM Radio for Every Vehicle Act of 2023 (Congressional Budget Office)

S. 1669 would direct the Department of Transportation (DOT) to issue a rule requiring that AM broadcast stations be accessible in all passenger motor vehicles manufactured in, imported into, or shipped within the United States. (Passenger motor vehicles are those designed to primarily carry their operator and up to 12 passengers; the definition does not include motorcycles.) The bill would require DOT to issue the rule within one year of enactment and to report to the Congress at least every five years on the rule’s effects.

Additionally, S. 1669 would require the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to study the role AM broadcasts in passenger vehicles play in disseminating emergency alerts through the Integrated Public Alert and Warning System. That study would need to be completed within 18 months of enactment.

Using information on the cost of issuing similar rules and studies, CBO estimates that implementing the bill would cost DOT and GAO a total of $1 million over the 2024-2028 period. Any spending would be subject to the availability of appropriated funds.

Additionally, S. 1669 would authorize DOT to assess civil penalties on manufacturers that fail to comply with the new rule; such penalties are recorded as revenues. CBO estimates that any additional revenues collected would total less than $500,000 over the 2024-2033 period because the number of violations would probably be small.

Click here to download the full report.

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Eclipse Time and Amateur Radio Astronomy Opportunities

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Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Marty, who writes:

Hi Thomas,
Here’s two interesting opportunities for hams and SWLers from NASA:

Radio Jove and HamSci:
https://www.popsci.com/science/radio-jove-solar-eclipse/

Link for required radio kit: https://radiojove.net/kit/order_form.html

From the article: “Radio JOVE hopes to improve our understanding of the ionosphere… if you’re a ham radio operator, you can get involved with HamSCI, which also plans to observe the upcoming eclipse.”

Sounds like fun!
Regards,
Marty

This is a brilliant idea and Radio Jove is a solid project. You’re right that enthusiasts should also follow HamSCI as they have many opportunities to be a citizen scientist in the radio realm! Thank you for sharing, Marty!

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How DXers can contribute to ionospheric research during the October 14, 2023 solar eclipse!

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Many thanks to SWling Post contributor, Nick Hall-Patch, who shares the following announcement:

How DXers can contribute to ionospheric research during the 14 October 2023 solar eclipse

There will be an annular solar eclipse on 14 October, 2023 when, at totality, the size of the Moon’s disk will appear slightly smaller than the size of the Sun’s disk.  This eclipse will affect all of North America, as well as Central and part of South America, as seen in the map below.

AM Broadcast Band DXers know that the blocking out of radiation from the sun during a total solar eclipse can introduce temporary night time listening conditions over an area far beyond the path of totality.

The upcoming annular eclipse is expected to have a similar effect on daytime medium wave listening conditions as would a total solar eclipse, and should not be missed by DXers.  Live listening can be done during the eclipse, as well as recording the entire medium wave band, using SDRs (software defined radios).

There might be more to our DXing results than new and unexpected receptions of distant radio stations, however.  The rapidly changing listening conditions will be indicating a similarly turbulent ionosphere, and DXers’ documenting those listening conditions through SDR recordings could provide information that will be useful to scientists who want to gain a better understanding of the Earth’s ionospheric dynamics.

How can DXers contribute to ionospheric research?

HamSCI is an organization of volunteer citizen-scientists and professional researchers who study upper atmospheric and space physics, and will be interested in examining MW DXers’ wideband SDR recordings made during both eclipses, and indeed, in having DXers assist with HamSCI’s research.

It will be important to have many participants in this project.  To sign up, please go to https://hamsci.org/mw-recordings/ and discover how to make sure that those DX files will also qualify as scientific data that can become part of the public record.

Those interested in finding out about all the research that HamSCI will be doing during the upcoming eclipses, check out https://hamsci.org/eclipse .  Especially if you are also an amateur radio operator, there are several other ways that you might contribute to the project.

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Radio Waves: RIP Phil Erwin, Federal Watchdog Targets Pack, Eclipse Festival of Frequency Measurement, and VOA testing DRM

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Radio Waves:  Stories Making Waves in the World of Radio

Because I keep my ear to the waves, as well as receive many tips from others who do the same, I find myself privy to radio-related stories that might interest SWLing Post readers.  To that end: Welcome to the SWLing Post’s Radio Waves, a collection of links to interesting stories making waves in the world of radio. Enjoy!

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributors Dave Zantow, Michael Guerin, Eric McFadden, and Dan Robinson for the following tips:

The voice of Phil Irwin will be greatly missed (Rappahannock News)

Where wasn’t the presence of Phil Irwin felt in Rappahannock County?

A constant of virtually all proceedings of the Rappahannock County community and government, cherished innkeeper of Caledonia Farm – 1812, founding member of the Rappahannock League for Environmental Protection, regional director of the Virginia Farm Bureau, committee member for both Rappahannock County Farmland Preservation and the Agricultural Forestal District, Rappahannock tourism advisory member — for 25 years chief of morning broadcasts for Voice of America (VOA) — Irwin was found dead Thursday at his working cattle farm north of Washington.

“What a contribution Phil made to our county over his many years here,” Huntly friend Ralph Bates reacted upon learning of Irwin’s death. “He will live in our memories as we drive and see how well our viewshed and environment has been protected because of his commitment and work.”

Former Washington Mayor John Fox Sullivan recalled “a good man and such a part of the Rappahannock fabric. His love for this county, and commitment to it, was unmatched.”[…]

Federal watchdog finds ‘substantial likelihood of wrongdoing’ by Trump appointees overseeing Voice of America (NBC News)

The federal watchdog’s findings mark the latest rebuke of the Trump-appointed CEO of the U.S. Agency for Global Media, Michael Pack.

WASHINGTON — A federal watchdog agency has found “a substantial likelihood of wrongdoing” by Trump administration appointees who oversee the Voice of America and other U.S.-funded media outlets.

The finding from the U.S. Office of Special Counsel, an independent government agency charged with safeguarding federal employees’ rights, marks the latest rebuke of Michael Pack, who President Donald Trump appointed to run the U.S. Agency for Global Media, the parent agency to VOA and other broadcasters.

A federal judge last month ordered Pack to stop interfering in the newsrooms of VOA and other media outlets and found that he had jeopardized the First Amendment rights of journalists that his office had targeted for investigation. Lawmakers from both sides of the aisle and press freedom groups have blasted Pack over his actions since he took over in June, accusing him of undermining the broadcasters’ editorial independence and defying congressional authority.

After reviewing allegations from current and recent employees, the Office of Special Counsel wrote to the whistleblowers Wednesday saying it had demanded Pack and the U.S. Agency for Global Media conduct an investigation into the allegations.[…]

The December 2020 Eclipse Festival of Frequency Measurement (HamSCI)

Changes in ionospheric electron density caused by space weather and diurnal solar changes are known to cause Doppler shifts on HF ray paths. For example, see Figure 7 in Boitman et al., 1999. HamSCI’s first attempt at a measurement of these Doppler shifts was during the August 2017 total solar eclipse. We plan a careful measurement during the 2024 eclipse. As part of the WWV centennial, 50 stations collected Doppler shift data for the original Festival of Frequency Measurement, demonstrating the value of volunteer participation in collecting this data. During the June 2020 Eclipse Festival, we enlisted participants around the globe and experimented with different data collection protocols. This winter, we request that all amateur radio stations, shortwave listeners, and others capable of making high-quality HF frequency measurements help us collect frequency data for the December 14 total eclipse.[…]

USAGM, VOA Testing Innovative Digital Radio Platform (Inside VOA)

A few weeks before the COVID-19 pandemic shut down much of the world, broadcast engineers in Greenville, North Carolina, launched a test of digital radio signals. The U.S. Agency for Global Media began aiming a digital broadcast at Cuba and Latin America, which included Office of Cuba Broadcasting and Voice of America content.

With this 2020 test, VOA embarked on a new phase of global innovation on a platform called Digital Radio Mondiale (DRM), a versatile digital signal not well known in the U.S., but the only one that can cover the entire spectrum: shortwave, mediumwave and longwave, as well as VHF (FM). As digital radio emerged in the 1990s, VOA was among the first broadcasters testing a signal that promised to even out shortwave radio signals that often faded in and out and were marred by static.

VOA tested the DRM signal in the 1990s at the agency’s Morocco transmitter site, one of five facilities opened in a period of expansion in the previous decade. However, other digital signals became the standard in various markets around the world. The U.S. standard audio digital platform is called HD.

Around the world, as other digital radio platforms were adopted, DRM was held back by the marketplace. Nobody was making commercially available receivers.

By the end of the 1990s, VOA innovation focused more on television, the platform that promised larger audiences, even in some places in the world where shortwave dominated. By the early 2010s, the rallying cry became “Digital First,” as VOA strived to attract readers for its language service websites and began tapping into the growing audiences on new social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube.

By 2020, however, DRM had come full circle.

“You’re no longer limited to just reading the news or playing music,” says Gerhard Straub, supervisory director of the USAGM Broadcast Technologies Division.

Straub, along with Gary Koster, Broadcast Radio Technician and transmitter expert and Macon Dail, Chief Engineer at the Greenville Transmitting Station, set up the test broadcast in February of this year, not long before the COVID-19 pandemic grounded global travel. The trio put up a DRM signal with Radio Marti and VOA audio along with scrolling text messages and rotating images.

Engineers have received reports of a clear signal as far south as Brazil.

The USAGM test, says Straub, is “coasting along” in the pandemic, but additional content will be added when technicians can travel again. Straub says the VOA signal was taken off in the initial test to concentrate on the OCB digital content and to keep the signal robust. Now that there is good reception data, he noted, the digital bit rate can be increased and VOA content added back into the test in 2021.

Because DRM operates at lower power, more radio stations and digital signals can be broadcast on a single transmitter. The platform is starting to grow in countries of interest to Western international broadcasters. DRM signals will soon cover all of China, though its government is expected to attempt to control the stations accessed by its citizens. India built 39 transmitters and, more importantly, 2.5 million vehicles already are equipped with DRM radios. Indonesia, Pakistan, Brazil and North Korea all have nascent DRM operations.

Religious broadcasters, who sometimes target audiences similar to those sought by Western governments, are experimenting with the technology. For example, a missionary group, TWR.org, sent the Bible’s Gospel of Mark from Guam to Cambodia via DRM shortwave.

“You have to stop thinking of it as radio, because it’s not,” says USAGM’s Straub. “We are now broadcasting digital data. Just like we broadcast digital data on the internet, we can broadcast digital data over shortwave without being hampered by an internet firewall that maybe limits what we can send to a particular country.”

Reason enough, Straub believes, for VOA to continue leading innovation in a new-again technology.[…]

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