[AMRadio] Strange band conditions

[Todd, KA1KAQ]

Managed to get on 75 for a bit last night and had a good conversation
with Paul, W9PJ in Illinois. The band was amazingly quiet overall, so
the lack of activity was a bit surprising. While the band seemed long,
I was hearing Steve WA1QIX quite strong up here as well.

But the really odd thing was the fading on signals. At times it was
like the ocean coming and going like waves, other times it was a
really fast fading that caused the needle on the S-meter to bounce 2-3
units to and fro wildly. But for most of the night it was a slow,
steady 'whump.....whump.....whump'. I've never seen the band maintain
this for a long period of time before. Maybe 10-15 minutes, half an
hour at most.

Heard Brian W5AMI coming in loud and clear, so I fired up the xmtr but
not in time to catch him. He said something about it being cold down
there. The WX Channel had mentioned that the former home of his 1937
xmtr got down to -2F Sunday night/Monday morning. That's even cold for
up here in early December.

~ Todd,  KA1KAQ