lunedì 4 gennaio 2010

Glenn Hauser logs January 3-4, 2009

** BRAZIL. In case I did not make it clear in previous report, I think RNA is running close to 250 kW on 11780, judging from the very strong signals here, not 7.5 kW as listed in Aoki. Of course many older transmitters are seldom running full rated power, so it may well be somewhat lower. But 11780 was also very strong S9+22 at 2316 Jan 3, altho as often in the afternoons, marred by trans-equatorial flutter. R. Bandeirantes was also audible, much weaker on 11925v.

WRTH 2010 shows 11780 as 250 kW, and also lists *inactive 250 kW on 15200 and 15265; plus active 250 kW on 11950, which is certainly not the case. All of these are Radiobrás transmitters, but the station entry keys, callsigns and names shown are mixed up. The 250 kW ones:

DF10   5990 ZYE773 Rádio Senado
DF06   6185 ZYE365 Rádio Nacional da Amazônia
DF06  11780 ZYE365 Rádio Nacional da Amazônia
DF06  11950 ZYE773 Rádiobrás [but same call as Senado on 5990]
DF06 *15200 ZYE365 Rádio Nacional da Amazônia
DF06 *15265 ZYE365 Radiobras [but same call as RNA; sic, no accent, in which case the name could be taken to mean instead ``Radio Works``]

5990 is the only active frequency of R. Senado, so it gets a separate entry with its own address; while the DF06 info just refers to Radiobrás, not RNA.

My previous report of RNA 11780 at 0550 UT Sunday had a typo on the date: should be Jan 3 of course instead of 4 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** CHILE. HCJB via CVC Calera de Tango, 11920, in Portuguese Jan 3 at 2320 sounds OK on fundamental, but still accompanied by motorboating spurs making music mushy centered at 11900 and 11940.

HCJB has been mailing out erroneous info about its own schedule, apparently confused by UT and the difference to DST in Brasília which is really only two hours. This should make Brazilians subjected to it feel 33% closer to Europe, but they mustn`t believe what HCJB tells them. HCJB also claims to ``transmit from Curitiba`` while that is only a studio location; not admitting to SW via Chile (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** CHINA. Firedrake Jan 3 at 2321: fair with flutter on 11300, not on 10210 or elsewhere. Jan 4 at 1410, very poor, flutter on 8400 only (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** GUAM. 9975, at 1423 Jan 4, amid the crap from SAIPAN [q.v.] 9990, heard preacher in English, but already to outro by announcer giving contact info including a twr.in address, P O Box and even phone number. 1424 signing off with frequency 9975 given, from ``life-changing radio, KTWR, Agaña, Guam`` and off at 1425*

Aoki shows KTWR B-09 on 9975 as 285 degrees in English at 1400-1420 on Mondays and Thursdays, 1400-1440 other days. The frequency is on daily from 1130 at 308 or 315 degrees in a mixture of Mandarin, Cantonese and Nosu Yi (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** INDIA. 9425, at 1432 Jan 4, AIR news in English, including bitter cold in north India, regions of Kashmir cut off, icy winds at New Delhi, poor visibility at airport, temp in Leh -13.6 C [= +7.5 F but we are predicted to subpass that this week in Enid], dense fog in U.P. causes bus services to be canceled.

1435 ID as National Channel with MW frequencies plus 9425, 9470, and into another English program starting with a few minutes of distorted music. S9+18 signal on 9425, with flutter, but JBA on 9470. 1441 into talk on historic monuments but just barely modulated for first semi-minute, then they turned it up! Geez, what amateurs in the studio. Something about 1618 AD = 1048 in another calendar, this speaker easier to understand, but her pauses were truncated unnaturally, in over-editing or less likely some digital playback problem. Mentioning The Red Fort, mixing Persian, Indian and English art forms (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** INDONESIA. VOI still missing from 9526v, not a trace Jan 4 at 1415 but RRI 9680 was poorly audible (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** ISRAEL. A few days ago I was wondering if Galei Tsahal was inactive on 19m, but others are still reporting it and now I am too: 15783.8, presumed this at 1503 Jan 4, very poor signal with talk in presumed Hebrew; far enough away from much stronger 15790, BBC Arabic due south from Cyprus (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** JAPAN. 17810, NHKWNRJ IS at strange time of 2307 Jan 3; next check at 2312, Indonesian was underway. Reason: this frequency is on the air from 2310 to 0020, with a semihour of Indonesian, and then a third of an hour each in Chinese and English. Apparently allows 5 minutes before and after for this 300 kW transmitter to change frequencies, until 2300 and from 0025. Meanwhile Indonesian and Chinese listeners have to get used to odd start times (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** PHILIPPINES [non]. Straining to hear any trace of KJES on 11715, Jan 4 [see also USA non]: none of that, but at 1520 a sermon in what I finally decided was English but with a heavy French accent, ruling out PB16 tho with similar aged voice, 1528 praying, 1531 slow hymns. This has to be the scheduled R. Veritas Asia relay via Vatican in Tagalog, back to Mideast gastarbeiter. I can only assume it`s another case of ESL being familiar to the Tagalog-speakers, but I`m sure they could do without the French accent; and surely preferable to robokids from Vado (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** SAIPAN. 9990, Jan 4 at 1420, very strong distorted FMy signal seems to be centered here, but splattering 9920 to 10025, with Vietnamese dialog, QRMing or blocking several stations, including WWV 10000, 9975 KTWR, Macedonian 9935, and incredibly, even WWCR 9980! At 1426, 9990 was registering S9+15, 1428 spelling out an e-mail address with English letters, 1429 announcement mentioning kHz; 1430 signal drops in strength as WWCR jumps in strength so now 9980 overload overcomes it. Recheck at 1457, 9990 had American English announcement, ``good night from Washington`` and off by 1458.

I figured this would be the IBB Saipan transmitter which has gone haywire before, and sure enough it is, Radio Free Asia in Vietnamese, 100 kW, 285 degrees on 9990 at 1400-1500 only.

Furthermore, the same kind of disorder was centered around 9727 in the next hour, at 1545, now a very distorted English lesson presented in a SE Asian language. This was splattering 9670-9750 roughly, again QRMing several unfortunate stations in the vicinity. Slope detexion makes it slightly more intelligible. 1549 registering S9+18 as some English-language phrases were being spelt out. Off at 1558* uncovering an Arabic station on 9725, presumably Tunisia on much earlier than scheduled *1700.

Yes, nominal 9725 is also IBB Saipan, exactly the same parameters as 9990 but this hour in Vietnamese is VOA instead. Pity the poor Vietnamese audiences of both stations, subjected to this. Is no one paying attention at Agignan Point?

After 1600 I quickly scanned the 7 and 9 MHz bands looking for a third outing of this monstrosity, but none found. Checking Aoki later, it might have been on 11720 as scheduled for RFA Uighur, but it`s hard to know which individual transmitter is used for which service. Also beware of 9455, RFA Chinese at 16-22, and 9355 at 17-22.

Two+ months ago we had the same kind of problem during VOA Cantonese service on 9705 between 13 and 15; that was Oct 25, see DXLD 9-078 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** SAUDI ARABIA [and non]. 13710, Jan 4 at 1501, Arabic just barely modulated on S9+12 signal, vs SAH and RHC modulation, and shortly into Qur`an with slightly better mod. BSKSA really needs to keep its audio levels up if it is to overcome the RHC leapfrog of 13770 over 13740 CRI relay landing on 13710. Meanwhile at 1505, BSKSA 15435 had bigger signal with wideband buzz (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** SOUTH CAROLINA [non]. 9385, WWRB Brother Scare service, Jan 4 at 1412 with hum, but worse, audio cutting out, and still doing so at 1432. For those who hang on his every word, there were still some available.

Again Monday Jan 4, WWCR stayed with PMS on 13845 past 1500, instead of scheduled BS. Still PMS at 1742 check, so is BS gone again from WWCR? His contract may have expired at decadend. But, the updated program schedule now as of Jan 1 at
http://www.wwcr.com/program-guides/WWCR_Program_Guide.pdf
still shows BS daily at 15-19 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** SUDAN [non]. 17745, Sudan Radio Service via PORTUGAL, Jan 4 at 1540, but audio cutting in and out, mostly out, making the whole thing pointless. Ain`t the digital age wunnerful? (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** TUNISIA. After the blob from Saipan [q.v.] cut off 9727 at 1558 Jan 4, it uncovered Arabic music on 9725, then at 1559 very expressive talk seemingly by or for children, 1600 heard same music theme twice, and presumed news in Arabic for adults. RTT supposedly opens this frequency at 1700 per Aoki, but WRTH has it from *1600, which is closer but still not early enough (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** U S A. 2366, Jan 4 at 1400, the seventh harmonic of beacon LSA in Lamesa TX, as previously identified, was again just barely audible, but could not get past the negative keying, and I have a hard time reversing my brain to copy Morse code that way. No sign of it on x9 = 3042, and it would be pointless to attempt it on x5 = 1690, a broadcast channel (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** U S A [and non]. WRMI, 9955, Monday Jan 4 at 1543 in Italian with Studio DX, weak but fortunately no jamming, so don`t say I never have anything nice to say about the DentroCuban Jamming Command. There was however a fast SAH and some co-channel audio, no doubt Family Radio as scheduled in Russian via Tainan, Taiwan. They are making progress, with only a SAH instead of the previous audible heterodyne, further off-frequency. Also in clear, DX Partyline from 1601 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** U S A [and non]. Re my previous comments about KJES missing from 11715 on Saturday: still missing on Monday during the one hour scheduled to be aimed toward Oklahoma, Jan 4 at 1448, nothing at all audible but presumed Uzbek from RFE Lampertheim. Of course, the last we heard KJES, it was just barely modulated anyway, so perhaps they have given up? See also PHILIPPINES [non] for next hour on 11715 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** VENEZUELA. Yimber Gaviría forwards a note from Denis in Honduras about five e-mail addresses for Radio Nacional de Venezuela, Canal Internacional, none of which work!

This is hardly surprising; since the announcers do not know the correct times and frequencies of their own broadcasts, why should they know and announce correct addresses?

I heard these two announced, first at the beginning of the 2300 UT Jan 3 transmission via CUBA on 15250, and the second one two minutes later:

canalinternacional @ rnv.gov.ve
canalinternacionalrnv @ gmail.com

I have not tried them, since I have nothing to say to RNV. The second one is on Denis` list as `no funciona`, but the first one is not; however, internacional @ rnv.gov.ve is, marked as bouncing.

The transmission began in clear Spanish, then switched to broken English by YL, with a long credit list of the dozen or so people it takes to produce this one-hour broadcast. Then a program summary, including ``Barrio Adentro`` which also happens to be the name of a show on Radio República, 9810, clandestine to Cuba as I recently observed, at this very same hour (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ###