lunedì 9 gennaio 2012

Glenn Hauser logs January 8-9, 2012

** ALBANIA [and non]. 7425, checking for R. Tirana`s collision with China, Jan 8 at 2354, only non-Albanian music, fairly good signal; then *2355 R. Tirana IS starts and mixes; other station off after 2357 leaving RT more or less clear. HFCC shows what the ChiCom are doing: 23-24 is 500 kW, 177 degrees, CRI Chinese via Kunming, and 00-01 is 100 kW, 174 degrees, CRI English via Kashgar, EAST TURKISTAN (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** ARGENTINA. 13363.5-LSB, Jan 9 at 0002, Spanish news about sugar produxion, female teacher murdered, Aló, Presidente resumed; 0004 ID as Continental, Bs.As. temp as 25.8; much better than 23 hours earlier, now R5 and still no sign of AFN Guam (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** CHINA. Firedrake Jan 9: still none found 7-19 MHz between 1445 and 1455 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** COSTA RICA [and non]. 5954.3, Sunday Jan 8 at 2357 I look for R. República via ELCOR, Cariari, a day after the much-publicized DX test, as it is supposed to be on the air anyway daily 23-24 --- but no signal, just the 5952+ carrier, i.e. BOLIVIA. However, at 2359, the 5954.3 carrier is on but no/lo modulation. Maybe it was a momentary failure, just before sign-off time (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** CUBA. 11930 & 13820, Jan 9 at 0640, DentroCuban Jamming Command is pulsing away against nothing, daytime-only frequencies of R. Martí. Maybe always there 24 hours, but only heard when propagational MUF favors (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** KOREA NORTH [non]. 5985, Monday Jan 9 at 1415, Shiokaze is in Chinese, with piano accompaniment; hardly any het from QRMyanmar (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** MAURITANIA. 7245, Jan 9 at 0629, IGIM is on with solo-singing rather than chanting, VG signal this time (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** MEXICO. 6010, Jan 9 at 1315, very poor signal in Spanish news, so R. Mil, XEOI. Difficult here and now, but maybe not if I were ever monitoring around 08-10 when it`s regularly reported even from Spain by Manuel Méndez. Lower bands have spring-like atmosferix from storms over north Texas (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGESET)

** NIGERIA. 7275, Jan 9 at 0628, Tunisia is already off while still VG on 7335, but something else is weakly audible on 7275, presumably FRCN Abuja. At 0632 it`s S9+18 but very undermodulated, M&W dialog unseems English (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** OKLAHOMA. It seems the two sports stations in Tulsa are getting mixed up: 1300 KAKC and 1430 KTBZ are jointly owned, affiliated with ESPN and FSN respectively:

1300, Jan 9 at 1347 UT, ``ESPN 1300, The Buzz``, signal peaking around sunrise with heavy IBOC noise on each side. I thought 1430 was ``The Buzz`` as implied by its calls. XEP takes turns dominating 1300. But on 1430 at 1350, ID as ``KTBZ 1430 AM``. At 1358, 1300 IDs again as ``ESPN 1300 The Buzz``, but then the 1300 station runs promo for ``Sports Radio 14-30 The Buzz``. So both of them must be ``The Buzz``; and BTW, no sign of IBOC on the sides of 1430, tho both are listed with it (Glenn Hauser, Enid, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** ROMANIA. 17530 // stronger 15460, Jan 9 at 1330, RRI Tiganeshti in German, again with strange modulation artifacts, sort of a ringing sound on each sideband, which can be reduced by tighter bandwidth, or heard individually with BFO sidetuning. I wish Kai Ludwig in Germany could hear and explain this (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** U S A. 11714.8, Jan 9 before and after 1500, no signal from KJES now for almost a week: perhaps they are prudently staying off the air following FCC Notice of Violation, until they can figure out how to get back on legal frequency (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** U S A. 1220, Jan 9 at 1340 UT, `AM 1220, KONZ(?)``, weather. Only likely match phonetically is KOMC, Branson MO (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** U S A. Strangeness on EWTN cable TV channel, Sunday Jan 8 at 1930-2000+ UT, the only time I ever condescend to watch it, during `Joy of Music`, with beautiful organ+ music (Canadian Brass too this week) and scenery, usually from Austria; one must only put up with the saccharine piety of Diane Bish.

Via Suddenlink cable in Enid, we get it on `channel 70`, both analog and digital, but the audio is hissy and mono even on digital cable, obviously not upgraded from analog origin. At 1953, during a pause in the music, I am hearing Morse code!! while watching the digital cable channel. Seems not to be hand-keyed, and mostly, but not exclusively numbers (5 dit/dash characters). Then could hear the same on analog version.

Can`t be something bleeding onto `ch 70` cable frequency locally; no video disruption either. Must be somewhere upline, between Irondale and here via satellite feed. But how in the world could this happen? It`s still going during the 1959 break before next program during EWTN promos, and at 2001 underneath the Apostles` Creed. I was recording the earlier part of the program for timeshifting while listening to other classical music on webcast from WPR, and checking that, the code was also during the entire JOM (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** VENEZUELA [and non]. Continued from previous report, the revival of `Aló, Presidente` Jan 8, also via RHC: I kept monitoring 13750, by far the best signal, and it kept playing music, so assumed A,P was still delayed, but finally at 1800 I recheck the other frequencies, and there`s Hugo! on 15370 best, 17750 next, 13680 worst, and nothing on 11690. Video+audio also underway on website. Cubans screwed up again failing to get the proper feed on the best SW frequency, the one for NAm.

At 1829 I notice that the music has stopped on 13750. Open carrier, cuts off and on briefly, 1831 finally starts modulating, picking up Aló Presidente. But not for long: Next check at 1912, all the RHC A,P frequencies are off, but Hugo goes on and on via the video webcast. A,P is open-ended as far as Venezuelan TV is concerned, maybe hours more (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

UNIDENTIFIED. 7200, Jan 9 at 0626, something is here with weak talk on AM, maybe Arabish, i.e. SUDAN, but ETHIOPIA has also been reported on 7200 at various times. Normally I don`t hear anything on 7200 at this hour, but Sudan is supposedly scheduled all the way from 03 to 21. At 0627 an AM ham hits the frequency calling CQ, KB3(?)-something. He is close enough to make a fast SAH; stronger signal but weak modulation. At 0630 he or another AM ham comes back far enough off 7200 to make an audible het. At 0643 all I can make out is a carrier, no modulation (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

UNIDENTIFIED. 9670, Jan 9 at 1420, continuous 1 kHz tone, rechecked at 1431, 1439, 1448, 1501, but gone at next check 1530. Only thing scheduled at 14-15 in HFCC, EiBi and Aoki is VOA Tibetan via Lampertheim, GERMANY, but no sign of anything but the tone. EiBi adds the inevitable CNR1 jammer, but no sign of it either. So suspect the tone was out of Lampertheim, lacking the VOA Tibetan input (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)