6m openings

Over the past couple of days there have been interesting openings on 6m in the 50.100 to 50.200 MHz SSB segment of the band. At the present time there are many European continental stations that are workable from my QTH in north west England. When using Google Earth in conjunction with the Ham Radio Deluxe logbook module I can see most of the stations I can hear are on the same geographical heading of around 310 degrees.

4 x 6m stations worked in around 10 minutes
all lying on the same direction

These stations varied in signal strength from 53 to 59 and sounded like they were in the same room. I did hear a couple of local stations in Manchester which were a few miles away but in the noise. I think they may have been using vertically polarized antennae whereas mine is horizontal. Therefore on direct path I would appear many decibels down to them. However the continental stations would be being worked on the skywave and polarization didn't appear to be much of an issue to them.

The 6m band is quite fascinating. Sometimes there appears to be nothing and then it can be loaded with many stations.
Soon after writing this the band went quiet again. All in the space of an hour!
My advice is keep your eye on the DX cluster in whatever area of the world you live in for advanced warnings.