John,
There are several factors at play. First is
population density. Europe has much greater
population density than North America does at the same
latitudes. "If the band is open and nobody is
transmitting, does anybody hear it"? :)
Second is geomagnetic latitude (as opposed to
geographical latitude). Take a look here:
http://www.nwra-az.com/ionoscint/maps/maplats.html
Notice that Europe shares the same geomagnetic
latitude as does North America's "southern" states.
Food for thought.
Regards,
Ev, W2EV
--- John Geiger <ne0p@lcisp.com> wrote:
> When reading the most recent World Above 50mhz
> Column in QST, some E skip from the September VHF
> contest was discussed. The big E skip opening in
> that contest was discussed, and Gene, W3ZZ, made
> this comment "The first thing to notice is that
> being farther north, the openings are nowhere near
> as good as for the southern stations." I have also
> heard in mentioned before that Eskip is better
> further south.
>
> Is this true? Are Eskip conditions better in the
> southern US as compared with further north? If so,
> why? Eskip doesn't seem to be related to the F
> layer, which is better further south. And Europe,
> which is further north than much of the US, seems to
> get much better 2 meter Eskip than we do. Does it
> have to do with the location of the magnetic north
> pole?
>
> 73s John NE0P
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