The unusual properties of meteor echoes recently observed at Jicamarca [Chapin and Kudeki, 1994> are attributed to the growth and propagation of plasma irregularities along meteor trails deposited within the equatorial electrojet. It is suggested that trails at electrojet heights must carry intense discharge currents that excite two-stream and/or gradient drift instabilities for irregularity growth. The direction of electron motion responsible for the discharge current agrees with the Doppler shift of the high frequency components in meteor echo signals. ¿ American Geophysical Union 1994