This page shows that reliance on just one measurement can lead to the wrong conclusion.
The global spot count showed unusual activity on Sunday (GMT), 22 January, 2023, before 04:00Z and after 12:00Z:
A video of spot counts showed concentrated activity in fields North America, particularly FN, and also some DX from QF:
Video, January 22, 2023
However, the activity in North America was largely limited to adjacent fields.
A plot of spot count from field FN showed unusualy activity until about 06:00Z, and again after about 12:00Z:
The first of those two periods was from 19:00 21 January to 01:00 22 January, local time, and the second was after 07:00 local. In the first of those two periods, there was very little DX activity (green line). There was more DX after 13:30Z, but the large majority was still local.
The average distance of those spots (blue line below) was not unusual at all, except perhaps to be smaller than normal. This supports the observation from the video above that there was a lot more 6m activity in eastern North America, and some of that exceeded 1000 km, but only barely. Further, the average spot distance, excluding spots traveling less than 1000 km, was not unusual at all.
So it seems that there was a lot more 6m traffic than usual, but almost none of it was DX.
Field QF showed about 30 minutes of above normal spots...
...and most of them were DX.
The unusual spot activity at the end of 22 January continued on Monday (GMT) 23 January, but ended abruptly at 04:00Z and did not return:
The spot count plot for field FN showed a pattern of activity that matched the previous global plot, ending abruptly at 04:00 23 Januaryi (23:00 22 January, local time).
The average distance was not unusual, though the average distance excluding spots less then 1000 km was higher than normal.
Conclusion: 6m activity in North America, particularly on the east coast, was much higher than normal, but included very little DX.
Explanation: The ARRL VHF Contest (North America) began on 2023.01.21 at 19:00 UTC, ending 2023.01.23, 04:00 UTC. Contestants used 6m (and higher frequency bands) but did not benefit from unusual propagation characteristics.