Oblique-incidence ionospheric soundings over Central Europe and their application for testing now casting and long term prediction models

Comparison of observed and predicted MUF(3000)F2 in the polar cap region

“…Stocker et al [] compared measurements and VOACAP predictions of HF propagation parameters for paths along the midlatitude trough and within the polar cap and found that signal strength was underestimated by VOACAP in the presence of off–great circle propagation. Similar studies have been done in the midlatitudes [e.g., McNamara et al , ; Zolesi et al , ; Pietrella et al , ; Tshisaphungo et al , ]. Efforts to explore the polar region have been limited by inadequate data, where most of the available ionospheric communication studies in the polar region have used limited data, mostly acquired in the 1960s–1970s.…”

Evaluation of the IRI model for the European region

“…We have chosen the IRI model because of its future advantages although it is seldom used in HF propagation tasks. We tried to compare our IRI results (recalculated to the other length of path) with results of (Pietrella et al, 2007) obtained by the other models (ASAPS, ICEPAC, SIRM&LKW) for some common days (5.04, 8.05, 15.05, 12.09: see Table 5). It can be shown that results of long term prediction are similar but the nowcasting model SIR-MUP&LKW provided better results although they are comparable with results for MUF(Pr).…”

An attempt to validate HF propagation prediction conditions over Sub‐Saharan Africa

“…Recently, a study was undertaken to assess the performance of the ICEPAC model using the maximum usable frequency (MUF) propagation parameter over Central Europe [ Zolesi et al , 2008; Pietrella et al , 2009]. The oblique ionospheric radio sounding measurements were considered for the circuits Inskip, UK (53.5°N, 2.5°W) and Rome, Italy (41.8°N, 12.5°E) and Inskip and Chania, Greece (35.7°N, 24.0°E) for periods which fell within the declining phase of solar cycle 23 (2003 and 2004).…”