Inside the Ionosonde Center At San Miguel De Tucuman, Argentina
This article is not an announcement of a department store opening nor does it
tell of a ribbon-cutting ceremony for a spectacular multi-million-dollar
shopping center. Rather
this article concerns the establishment of a new
Vertical Incidence Soundings transceiver in South America. Many readers will be
familiar with vertical incidence soundings
(ionograms) transceivers and the use of the
tracings that they produce. Even so, not everything about the ionosonde center
at San Miguel De Tucumán
will necessarily be “old
hat”
(very familiar material).
Left : The delta antenna located at the Ionosonde Center in San Miguel De Tucuman, Argentina. The Center opened in August, 2007. Photo courtesy INAG Bulletin. The INAG Bulletin is published by Australia's IPS Radio Space Services.
The Tucuman Ionosonde Station is located on the slopes of the Aconquija Mountains in Tucuman, Argentina. The geographical coordinates of the Tucuman Station are latitude: 26.9° south; longitude 65.4° west. These geographical coordinates, put the Station at the southern most point of the "equatorial anomaly".
The Station's medium (500 watt) power transceiver includes an Advanced Ionospheric Sounder. Software used with the ionosonde includes the program, Autoscala, which is used to automatically scale the Station's ionograms. Autoscala's data output includes values for foF2, MUF(3000)F2, M(3000)F2, fxI, foF1, ftEs (the top frequency of the sporadic E layer), and h’Es.
Data from the Tucuman Center is available on the
Internet and World Wide Web in .GIF
(Graphics
Interchange Format) and .TXT (text) formats. Data may be accessed through the
following URL:
http://ionos.ingv.it/tucuman/latest.html
In the future, the data may be fed into
international space weather data bases where it could be incorporated with data
from other sites and be rendered into a form that depicts a global ionospheric
profile complete with high frequency propagation nowcasts and forecasts - in a
format meaningful and easily comprehended by hams in all of the amateur radio
license classes.
Above: Picture of the ionosonde located within the Tucuman Center. Photo courtesy INAG Bulletin. The INAG Bulletin is published by Australia's IPS Radio Space Services.
Webmaster's
Note: the subject of the "equatorial anomaly” is
not discussed in this
article. The anomaly is mentioned because of its
significance to readers already familiar with the subject. The topic merits an
article of its own and it will the subject of a future article. However since we
mentioned it, we will note that the equatorial anomaly is associated with
a phenomenon previously discussed on the website: Equatorial Spread F
propagation.
Right: Map showing the location of the Ionosonde Center at San Miguel De Tucuman, Argentina. Geographic coordinates (lat. 26.9° south; longitude 65.4° west) are at the southern most point of the equatorial anomaly. Webmaster's Note: the coordinates shown in the map's insert have an error in the value given for the longitude. Map courtesy INAG Bulletin. The INAG Bulletin is published by Australia's IPS Radio Space Services.