This is a compilation of my personal longest distance records, listed separately for each band and mode. As it is not always easy to span large distances on VHF & up, the distance is a good measure for how unusual a DX contact has been.

¤ Phantastic to work EA on Tropo, finally. I have monitored ducting, listened and called for about 10 years. There are 3 sea and three land areas over which inversions need to prevail simultaneously. For about one hour EA1DDU was the only station I could hear on the band!

The contact was made in random SSB at the beginning of my operation from JO59. The burst lasted for 2 minutes, which gave me enough time to connect the power amplifier to the car battery.

The other contacts listed in the "firsts" were made in the same opening

The second contact is from my previous QTH in DL.

This contact was made on random SSB. RV3IB was using only 5 W and a 16 ele-yagi (!) ... 59 reports on both sides.

Strangely enough, my tropo ODX on 70 cm is much longer than on 2 m. Troposhperic ducting is often more pronounced on 70 cm, but there are usually fewer stations on air. The event that made these long contacts to UA6 possible was a temperature inversion layer that spanned the whole path, thanks to the low altitude of the territories crossed. This is confirmed by topographic profile analysis performed after the contacts were made. The surface pressure map shows there wass a huge high pressure area over Lithuania, approximately at midpoint of the path.

On the 23 cm band I have never had a big setup, but always operated with a rather small antenna and only 15 W of output power. Also my focus in operation during good tropo conditions was usually on 2 m or 70 cm, as I have better equipment for these bands.