Eric Tichansky, NO3M, and Roger Crofts, VK4YB, are claiming a new world distance record on 630 meters. They worked each other on October 14 at 1032 UTC using JT9 mode. Tichansky said the contact represented the culmination of 2 years of effort around every equinox since September 2017.

“Hopes were wearing thin as we were moving away from the recent equinox on September 23,” he said. “Even when the path may have been open over the past 3 weeks, either end would be plagued with QRN.” He said that while the opening that facilitated the record-breaking contact was not comparably as strong as past openings, “something special was obviously at play.”

The contact covered 9,307.5 miles (14,979 kilometers), topping the previous record of 8,351.9 miles set by Roger Crofts, VK4YB, and Kenneth Roberson, K5DNL, by nearly 1,000 miles. Tichansky said his transmit antenna is a 67-foot top-loaded vertical, and the receive antenna is a full-sized eight-circle array comprised of short verticals. The transmit/receive at VK4YB is a linear-loaded vertical. — Thanks to Eric Tichansky, NO3M