WQ6X Works another nearly-Wrecked WAE Contest

The 2nd radiosport weekend in August brought us a triple whammy radiosport weekend. 
Beginning with a solar CME blindsiding Earth around Friday evening, it became increasingly
chaotic as the weekend progressed, finally settling down by Sunday morning.  Offsetting that somewhat, I had access to  STN-2 @ super-station WA6TQT ("Radio Ranch") atop the mountain
in Anza, with it's bevy of stacked arrays.

Getting a later start than I wanted, on Friday evening WQ6X missed whatever 40-meter opening
there was; if Friday evening compares to Saturday, then approx. ~50 QSOs were missed by that
late start.  Only II2S and EA5FID made it to the log.  Tuning around on 20-meters no WAE activity
was heard.  Ironically, a dozen (mostly LOUD) VK / ZL stations were heard working Europe, even
off the back of the yagi stacks.  With no need to run a 2am shift (as is done when working Asia),
there was an opportunity to get plenty of sleep.

Saturday overall was largely a BiG disappointment.  Space-WX investigations revealed the K-Index between 4 - 5, with a comparatively high A-Index (40 to 50).  20-meters never opened until well after the poor opening on 15-meters (which produced another 2 QSOs)and brought only another 2 QSOs for a WHOPPING total of 6 (hard earned) QSOs.  

Being a Cw only contest, using the QF-1A-based Stereo-Cw facility often made the difference between no-copy on receive and shifting the signal to a different "location" in the listening experience
to pull a given station out of the noise (already reduced considerably by the K3/0-mini's NR facility).  When running frequencies. using the R-I-T control brought seriously-off-frequency stations perfectly into the passband.  When the F3-TU function key is pressed, it resets the R-I-T back to Zero (0).

Moving to 40-meters @02:06z, was just in time for a West coast opening to EU. 
Those on the East coast had been at it on 40-meters for hours.  While a LoT of time
was spent in S&P mode, w/the WQ6X call, calling CQ produced several fine frequency
runs w/enough QSOs to make possible sending several "books" of 10 QTC messages.

Throughout the day, the bands
were near-futilely scoped looking for Maryland DC (MD) QSO Party stations. 

With only 12 QSOs (with 8 actual stations) and no internet spots, I again asked the question: "What's the point
of hosting a state QSO party with only
a dozen in-state stations participating? "

At least another radiosport contest was added to the 3830 scores list (currently
@78 GiGs thus far).  As EU moved into daylight, one more QTC book was sent before, 40-meter  opportunities quickly disappeared  (@04:17z) - 20-meters offered nothing.

Sunday morning, starting @17:15z 20-meters seemed rather dormant (EU-wise), however
15-meters was loaded w/possibilities.  Thanks to a finally declining K-Index, the band remained
open for some time well after sunset in Europe.  Running out of QSO/QTC possibilities at  @22:17z, moving down to 20-meters picked-up (somewhat) where 15-meters left off adding 6-QSOs to the log.

Before I realized, the final hour was approaching and there were still 22 undelivered QTC messages.  Out of nowhere, EF5Y and RA1A enabled me to dump 16 of those QTCs messages, being stuck
with only 6  messages undelivered,  resulting in an approx. ~480-point lost opportunity.

When it was all over WQ6X placed 46th in the SOALP category.

In summary, looking back on the weekend, it would seem that the number of participating EU
stations was way down from last year, while the number of USA stations, significantly increased.

DiD YOU work the WAE Cw contest?

If you are an EU station, is WQ6X in YOUR LoG?