Variation of radio field strength and radio horizon distance over three stations in Nigeria

• Surface refractivity values were higher in Enugu than Akure and Minna.
• Higher FSV may generally be expected in Minna than in Akure and Enugu.
• Higher coverage area of transmitting antennas is expected in Northern part of Nigeria than the Southern part.

In this work, we present seasonal results of radio field strength and radio horizon distance derived from the computation of surface refractivity through in-situ measurement of temperature, relative humidity and pressure across three stations (Akure, Minna and Enugu) in Nigeria. The measurements of the tropospheric parameters were made using a Davis Wireless Weather Station (Integrated Sensor Suite, ISS) installed on the ground surface at each of the stations. The study utilized data for two years of measurement (January 2008–December 2009). Results show that the values of surface refractivity were low during the dry season months and high during the wet season months. The lowest values of 323, 313 and 281 N-units were observed in February for Akure, Enugu and Minna respectively, while maximum values of 372, 375 and 365 N-units were observed in September, October and August for the respective locations. Also, the average value of field strength variability was found to be 6.67, 5.62 and 7.48 for Akure, Enugu and Minna respectively.