sabato 7 marzo 2009

Glenn Hauser logs March 7, 2009

** GREECE. Never mind the reduced VOG schedule they sent John Babbis, showing 9420 instead of other frequencies most of the time: March 7 at 1347 there was no signal at all on 9420, but at 1409 I was hearing Greek on 15650. However, that was gone by 1500 so I could hear Miraya FM unimpeded; see SUDAN [non] (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** INDONESIA [and non]. Gone again: no sign of VOI on 9525, March 7 at 1347 and 1455 chex. I could detect a very weak carrier on 9525, but probably something else. If VOI switched to 11785 this date, they were totally blown away by WHRI/Hmong Lao Radio. Meanwhile, India was inbooming on 9425, 9870 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** INTERNATIONAL. Some ham DX contest must be underway, which is what it takes to find out if a band is really open for propagation. March 7 at 1413 I found good signals from Ascension on 21630 and 21470 so tuned below 21450.

Several hams were heard with the briefest possible contacts, concluding with ``5-9-K`` or -kilo, apparently meaning they were running 1000 watts of power and the contactee was heard with max strength and readability. Saying ``one thousand`` rather than ``K`` would eat up too much time which could be applied to racking up more meaningless contax.

All on USB, of course, with locations looked up on their qrz.com pages, as they aren`t about to waste time mentioning that on the air either:

1413 on 21325, VP2E with various VEs and Ws [a long entry all about QSL managing and IRCs finally mentions Anguilla at the very bottom]
1415 on 21286, HI3TEJ, who was only 5-9-100 [Puerto Plata, D. R.]
1417 on 21273, ZX5J [Rancho Queimado, Santa Catarina, Brasil]
1418 on 21332, HI3K [also Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic]
1419 on 21305, 6Y1V [Hopewell, Jamaica]
I then tried the 24 and 28 MHz bands, but nothing at all heard; and on the 18 MHz band no contesting heard, just ragchews; is that off-limits for contesting? (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** JAPAN [non]. 11705 via Sackville, March 7 at 1428: once again the monthly haiku segment on NHKWNRJ`s World Interactive show is in limbo, as Shokan mentioned at conclusion, ``I hope we have a next time``. That would be on the first Saturday in April, in a new fiscal year after Radio Japan has made more programming changes (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** RUSSIA. 6075, R. Rossii, another check to 1400* March 7 with 5-second-late timesignal on motorboating carrier, and no 8GAL CW marker to be heard on 6074. I promise soon to stop reporting its non-reception (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** SUDAN [non]. V. of Greece has had a transmitter failure, resulting in some frequencies off the air, altho the true schedule is confusing and contradictory. Anyhow, this benefits Miraya FM, the service from Sudan, transmitted back to the country via IRRS, via Slovakia at 1500-1800 on 15650. Until now the first 50 minutes has been colliding with Greece, but now March 7 I heard Miraya in the clear: 1500 tune-in to some ghetto music which I thought unseemed Greek, 1501:16, a very late 5-pip timesignal, and news in English about Darfur, etc. Still poor reception with flutter and could not copy most of it, but at 1506 upfaded momentarily for a clear ``You are listening to the news from Miraya FM``. 1512 went out of English. I had been apprehensive, since I was indeed hearing Greece an hour earlier on 15650 instead of 9420 where they had supposedly retracted (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** TURKEY. VOT, 12035, Saturday March 7 at 1350 tune-in, DX Corner already underway with Seref reading nothing but reception reports, one from Mukesh Kumar at the moment, complete with his geo coordinates, SINPOs and SIOs. BORING --- except to the individuals quoted, but this avoids stealing DX info without credit from DXLD. Ended at 1354:30. Went back and listened to the audio which started at :18 into the program, to be sure there was no DX news. Correct. Is fortnightly.

I have also just received in the p-mail VOT`s program schedule for the first half of 2009, from which you would conclude that DX Corner is sevnightly, i.e. weekly, if it were not for the unexplained / after the preceding entry, Turkey`s Pleasant Destinations, which must be its alternator (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

UNIDENTIFIED. 17450, that ear-splitting screech/whine was back, March 7 at 1515; depending on fades it spread out to 10 or at least 20 kHz either side. The pitch sounds the same on AM, but with BFO on, and with the slightest touch of the tuning knob, you hear multiple carriers going past; there must be dozens of them per each kHz. Still waiting for someone in the know to identify this (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ###