skip zone

The skip zone is a natural phenomenon that cannot be influenced by technical means.

A point is eventually reached when decreasing the frequency results in a zero distance skip zone.

Another factor which will affect skip zones is the width of the ionosphere.

Transmitting at night is most effective for long distance communication but the skip zone becomes significantly larger.

With a fixed working frequency, large changes in ionospheric conditions may create skip zones at night.

Very high frequency waves and higher travel through the ionosphere and therefore generate no skip zone but again have a limited range.

Another method of decreasing the skip zone is by decreasing the frequency of the radio waves.

A typical phenomenon of shortwave propagation is the occurrence of a skip zone (see first figure on that page) where reception fails.

At higher latitudes, a noticeable skip zone sometimes appears on the band during darkness hours in midwinter, which can be as much as 300 miles/500 km, rendering communication with some nearby stations impossible.

A skip zone is an annular region between the furthest points at which the ground wave can be received and the nearest point at which the refracted sky waves can be received.

A skip zone, also called a silent zone or zone of silence, is a region where a radio transmission can not be received located between regions both nearer and further from the transmitter where reception is possible.