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What to listen to · Amateur radio
FT8 on 15 metres: 21074 kHz, long-haul by day
On 15 m the short paths vanish and what remains is distance: Japan, South America, the Pacific in daylight. FT8 on 21074 kHz lives by the solar cycle and is easiest in the years around a maximum.
What you hear
The FT8 chorus of the main article, but the decodes read differently: fewer neighbours, more continents. On 21074 kHz a European receiver sees South America and the Caribbean in the afternoon, Japan and East Asia in the morning, and when the band is really open, the Pacific.
Who transmits and why
Amateurs chasing distance. 15 m needs a healthy ionosphere, so in the quiet years of the solar cycle it opens briefly or not at all, and in the active years it becomes the easiest DX band there is: small antennas work, low power works, and the noise is low. FT8 is what people run while waiting for the band to open, because the decoder notices an opening before an ear would.
When and where to listen
Daylight only, roughly from two hours after sunrise to sunset, with a bias towards whichever end of the path is in the sun. Autumn and spring are the reliable seasons; in summer the band can be dead at noon and open at 20:00 UTC through sporadic E. Receivers near the coasts show the longest paths. The dial is 21074 kHz, USB.
In ShackDeck
Station catalogue → Amateur radio → FT8 15 m. The program picks a public receiver with 21074 kHz, sets FT8 mode and decodes: callsigns and locators appear in the On air list and on the map every fifteen seconds. No receiver, antenna or account of your own is needed.