Further evidence that the solar cycle has bottomed out and is on the way up is with us again as we go to air. Space Weather News for December 13th reported that sunspot 930 erupted again producing a strong X3-class solar flare.

The solar blast triggered an ongoing radiation storm and probably hurled a coronal mass ejection or C-M-E toward Earth.

Spaceweather.com says that auroras are possible when the C-M-E arrives on December 15th and continuing for several days. Typically, this can mean poor High Frequency radio conditions but also a good chance that 6 meters and above could come alive with some unexpected D-X.

If you hearing this on December 14th 15th or 16th , and have the gear, you might want to monitor the calling frequency of 50.125 MHz over the next several days. With these solar conditions you never know what rare station you might hear. (Handi Ham News, spaceweather.vom)