#60m band DX January 2020

You would think that I worked most of the DX that can be worked on 60m already last year. But that isn't the case. The 60m DX story goes on in 2020 and it seems not that much affected by the solar cycle. What is left are the more exotic DX stations far away and with sporadic activity. Let's look back at last month DX.

The 2020 60m band DX season begins with a DXpedtion to the Cyprus Sovereign Base Areas of Akrotiri and Dhekelia, british territory. The ZC4UW DXpedition refuses to use FT8 or any other JT mode and only used CW and SSB. Initially they wrote on their website they would probabely not activate 60m since they didn't expect to make much QSOs with only 15W CW/SSB. But they were wrong, they had a excellent signal on 60m and had decent pile-ups anyway. I worked ZC4UW on CW at 5 January as my first 60m new one in 2020.

Previously I worked V51WH from Namibia on 10m in the ARRL 10m contest. I did hear Gunter before on 60m SSB and CW in the past years but was never able to work him for a new one. Till I saw him appearing on FT8. Unfortunately it was a new one for many and the pile up was huge. It took me almost a whole week, calling for 6 evenings, hours and hours of calling. But in the end I finally got him in the log. I worked V51WH on FT8 at 11 January.

Suddenly XV1X Eddy appeared on 60m FT8. Eddy is a fellow dutch guy (previously known as PA0DDT) that has been living in Vietnam after he married his vietnamese wife. Unfortunately Eddy is not well, he suffered a heart attack and has almost no sight. Not certain he is operating FT8 himself, probabely he has help from his wife being his eyes. Eddy unfortunately had a lightning strike in his station last year and he uses borrowed equipment. He asks 3 USD for a QSL card. As you know I don't like to buy cards, but in this situation I'm certain he will use the money to buy new equipment and improve his station if he is capable to do so under the circumstances. I worked XV1X on FT8 at 17 January. I still see him regulary on 60m FT8, actually almost every day...

YS1RS El Salvador, you hardly see a station on 60m from that area. Roberto is a communication specialist working for the UN in various programmes. He has a nice QRZ page, well worth reading. I worked YS1RS on FT8 at 18 January.

JT1BV Mongolia, I've seen other stations working him on 60m FT8 but never saw him myself. Then suddenly at the evening of 21 January his signal was coming up and being up high in the band I had the chance to work him with some perseverance.




J88HF Harm is sailing around the Grenadines (Saint Vincent/Grenada). He has his own yacht charter business.  Harm is also a fellow dutchman and his dutch call is PE1IGM. We had some e-mail contact last year in september about RFI and how to solve it. Not easy to get rid of RFI when you're on a boat without a ideal antenna installation. But in the end a lot of ferrite did the trick. Being active on 60m has probabely something to do with his QSL manager and fellow blogger PA3C who recently got into 60m DX seriously. Harm and me did try to make a sked on 20m last year but it didn't work out. I managed to make the QSO now on 29 January.