Long Delayed Echoes

Jovian, I agree that it shouldn't have been possible and there must have been another explanation.

Just for fun, I also ran the numbers on it:

c = 299 792 458 m / s

distance to moon (in miles) = 238,900 mi

First LDE delay: 3.516s

Last LDE delay: 15.074s

Reflection distance on first LDE delay: 327484.45 miles

Reflection distance on last LDE delay: 1404010.43 miles

Change in distance: 1076525.97 miles

Duration between first and last LDE measurements: 519.822s

Average apparent speed of reflecting object: 2071 miles per second or 7455424 mph

My numbers seem to match yours, more or less. Keep in mind that I wasn't aiming the antenna at the sky; it was aimed at the horizon, if that matters at all.

I should also add that I was operating at relatively low power; the radio could only do around 50 Watts. My license restricts me to operating at no more than 200 Watts PEP on 10 meters but I have no radios that can transmit anywhere near that.

Thanks for giving detailed info.

If you were transmitting QRP, then somebody very nearby had to be deliberately re-transmitting. As in, they would have to be within a couple miles. I looked around in Google Maps and didn't see any houses in that direction with ham radio antennas visible and it looks like mainly farms or mini-mansion types that wouldn't be owned by people pulling stunts like that.

Elwood, Indiana would be too far. I'm surprised you could see lights from there. I'm not local to the area, mind you, just going from what I see on the map.

The buzz in the recording makes sense because there are power lines going across the field next to where you were. But like I said, no ham or other kinds of antenna towers along that path for quite a few miles.

There IS a wind farm along that path about 13 miles out but that wouldn't have anything to do with it.

Shoot, I'm baffled.

I did find something that probably explains the weird interference / noise you got in the background but it doesn't explain anything about the echo.

That wind farm 13 miles out probably was the source of the noise. Especially if you pointed a directional antenna right at it.

Seems likely the cause.

Good find, sloop! I had heard of a wind farm near here but never bothered to go check it out. There are much larger windmills going up toward Chicago. It seems they are a little too far away to create *that* much noise on the frequency, though. Still, your guess is as good as mine. It seems like you have some background in radio theory.

I noticed a neat coincidence while figuring out the antenna orientation last night. If the line is extended much further, it goes all the way back to Middletown - in fact, precisely to where I went to high school. I should note that I was able to figure out the heading by remembering the tree line, where the city lights (supposedly) from Elwood where, and the power line poles that ran across the field. There's a chance the estimate was off but I'm fairly confident it was right at about 121 to 123 degrees.

That's some crazy stuff. I've never heard of radio echoing before like that although I know that people on CB back when that was popular used to use microphones that had an echo for some reason. That or they used illegal amplifiers that caused echo somehow.