mercoledì 9 luglio 2014

Glenn Hauser logs July 8, 2014

** BRAZIL. 11765-11795, July 8 at 0112, RNA 11780 is splattering out to here, aside 11795 Spain Sephardic from 0115, and 11760 Cuba. No discrete spurs audible now on 11750/11810; but they are at 0542, the lower one stronger, and fundamental is overmodulated/distorted. It seems they could get rid of all this if they backed off the modulation level (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** CHINA. My pre-sunset bandscan UT July 8 at 0120 finds a bunch of // weak CNR1s in the 17s, poor to very poor, with targets from Aoki:
17890, not a jammer, imagine that, Beijing 572 site
17595, not a jammer, imagine that, Shijiazhuang 723 site 
17580, not a jammer, imagine that, Lingshi 725 site
17565, not a jammer, imagine that, Beijing 572 site
17550, not a jammer, imagine that, Beijing 572 site
17540, finally, a jammer! vs RFA Uighur via Tinian at 01-02
None in the 16s or 18s

17730 has the usual het at 0119 July 8, presumably CNR1 jamming vs off-frequency secret deniable Mongolian site of RFA Tibetan

Awake early enough July 8 to check the CNR1 jam situation before 1200:
12370, July 8 at 1153, CNR1 jammer, good signal
12980, July 8 at 1153, CNR1 jammer, good
10960, July 8 at 1155, CNR1 jammer, fair
14870, July 8 at 1156, CNR1 jammer, very good
16100, July 8 at 1158, CNR1 jammer, poor; none in the 17s, 18s

After 1200, rapidly scanning for parallels:
15250, July 8 at 1203, CNR1 jammer with echo, lo het
15195, July 8 at 1203, CNR1 jammer with CCI; a bit of classical music
 7345, July 8 at 1236, CNR1 jammer, very poor --- oops, not a jammer!
 7385, July 8 at 1236, CNR1 jammer, fair, vs RTI
 7445, July 8 at 1237, CNR1 jammer, very poor, vs RTI
 9500, July 8 at 1239, CNR1 jammer, very poor --- oops, not a jammer!
 9660, July 8 at 1240, CNR1 jammer, poor, vs RTI
 9680, July 8 at 1241, CNR1 jammer, heavy CCI from Taiwan, Indonesia
11605, July 8 at 1242, CNR1 jammer, very poor vs RFA Tibetan Tinian
11785, July 8 at 1243, CNR1 jammer, fair with CCI
13605, July 8 at 1246, CNR1 jammer, JBA vs AIR Chinese, Martí carrier
15195, July 8 at 1248, CNR1 jammer
15250, July 8 at 1248, CNR1 jammer, with CCI, almost no het now
15580, July 8 at 1250, CNR1 jammer, het on hi side from V of Tibet
16360, July 8 at 1251, CNR1 jammer, good; none in the 17s
18990, July 8 at 1252, CNR1 jammer, very poor; vs Tue & Fri 12-13 RFA Tibetan via KUWAIT (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** CHINA. 11875, July 8 at 1147, good signal with flutter, Chinese language lesson, repeating similar words but with different tones, and commentary also in Chinese. Since this is Aoki-listed as Chaozhou language from CRI at 11-12, 500 kW, 177 degrees from Kunming-Anning site, I assume they are teaching Mandarin to the Chaozhou; or Standard Chinese to the non-standard (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** CUBA. 9790, July 8 at 0540, CRI relay transmitter is *still* on the air with huge dead-air signal, the RadioCuba slopperators having failed to turn it off at 0500.

11840, July 8 at 0543, RHC transmitter is also still on the air with dead air. By 0548 recheck, they`ve awakened (literally?) and turned both off (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** GREECE [and non]. 9935, July 8 at 0117, new frequency from ERTOpen is gone again, after activity July 4-5-6 but not checked July 7. John Babbis believes the Avlis operators were merely temporarily asserting their rights to this frequency, not in regular use. He did hear 9935 on UT July 7. Now 9420 is very poor at 0117 July 8 (and could be Iran Arabic if Greece is off), no other ERTOs audible in the 7s, 11 or 15s. John Babbis confirms that 9420, 9935 and 15630 were all unheard from 1900 July 7 past 0200 July 8 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** INDIA. 15040, July 8 at 1302-1315* mostly nice music, Burmese? from AIR`s Burmese service with fair signal; yet, before 1300 nothing from Bangladesh on 15105 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** INDONESIA. 9526-, July 8 at 1136, no signal at all from VOI. It`s long been a lost cause for any chance to hear its English at 13-14 UT, no signal then either. Atsunori Ishida says this transmitter was on July 6, but off July 5, 7 and 8 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** MEXICO. 710-, July 8 at 0601 UT, again off-frequency het to the lo side of KCMO. The pitch is hard to pin down on my keyboard, but tentatively circa F#3 below Middle C, which is 185 Hz. Choral Mexican NA is playing, which means it`s in the UT -6 zone, fitting for the WSW DF. 0605 multiverse NA finally ends, and on to ``Soy Soldado`` super-patriotic, ultra-military recitation; 0608 Chihuahua state anthem, now overcoming KCMO even with AM tuning rather than LSB. Therefore it has to be XEDP, La Ranchera de Cuauhtémoc, IRCA-listed day power of 5 kW and unknown at night or whether 24 hours. WRTH 2014 says 7 kW day, 100 watts night! XEDP is also a common catch around sunrise with much better reception, but when last heard some months ago was not audibly off-frequency (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** MEXICO. July 7 was a respite day for sporadic E after all the axion on July 6, but some is back UT July 8:

0051 on 2, algo CCI from SSW

0055 on 2, now it`s a novela with Televisa-2 net star bug in LR

0200 on 2, still CCI

0200 on 3, dramatic film with Televisa-5 bug in LR

0218 on 4, novela with Televisa-2 star bug LR, probably XHBS Sinaloa

0230 on 4, same still in, but now with CCI

0312 on 3, news from XHBC with its blue square bug in LR with white 3 and tiny call letters going upward on left side. Mexicali BCN

0322 on 5, waiting for the other Mexicalian to MUF in, and now it does, XHAQ with Azteca-13 bug in UR, contest or talk show, heavy ghosting like 3, soon gone

0333 on 3, XHBC still in but very poor with fading

0400 on 3, presumed XHBC fades in again briefly with novela
(Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** NIGERIA. 15120-AM, July 8 at 0547, VON again with good signal level but very undermodulated in English. I`m not going to strain to try to make it out (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** PAPUA NEW GUINEA. 3205 & 3385, July 8 at 1140, shortly after sunrise here, JBA carriers on NBC frequencies, and a better unID one circa 3229 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** PAPUA NEW GUINEA [and non]. 7325, July 8 at 1144, VP signal with some talk; with BFO sounds like there are two carriers on slightly different frequencies. This was expected to be an open window for off-frequency to lo side Wantok Radio Light reception during a one-month maintenance break by CRI`s 7325 transmitter, per Aoki:
7325xCHINA RADIO INTER. 1000-1257 1234567 Japanese 500 59 Jinhua-Youbu 831 CHN 2906N 11918E CRI a14 Jun.18-Jul.15 off

but I also see in Aoki that it`s been ruined by another new RFI Chinese broadcast via Paochung, Taiwan, // 9955 since June 8, here only at 1100-1200, so we should still try after 1200:
7325 R.FRANCE INT. 1100-1200 1234567 Chinese 250 352 Paochung TWN 2343N 12018E RFI a14//9955 Jun.8
(Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** PERU. 5980, July 8 at 0110, JBA R. Chaski carrier until cutoff at 0116:26.5* which is 23.5 seconds later than last check on July 4, i.e. averaging 5.875 seconds later per day (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** SARAWAK [non]. 15425, July 8 at 1158, good signal from R. Free Sarawak in presumed Iban talk; and still on 15425 at 1202. Seems to be staying on 15425 now for entire 1100-1230 broadcast rather than jumping around. Never any jamming audible here, but I assume there is some by and for Malaysia but from somewhere else (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** SOUTH CAROLINA [non]. 11565, July 8 at 1150, Brother Scare with VG signal, as scheduled 10-12 via WHRI. Compared to 11825 via WRMI, not synchronized, and in fact so far off that I did not want to listen long enough to time the difference. WRMI has also put TOM on 11565 previously at certain hours (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) See also USA: WTWW

** TURKEY. 15450, July 8 at 1249, surprisingly good signal from VOT in English for Europe, which despite same angle to North America, has not been propagating much this summer; discussion of Henry VIII and the Anglican church, of all things (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** U K [non]. 15640, July 8 at 1152, surprised to find good signal with interview in English, no doubt BBCWS; I lucked into one of the two hours per week on this frequency via Kranji, SINGAPORE, supposedly to confuse/escape ChiCom jamming: Tue & Sun 11-12, per Aoki since May 18, 100 kW at 13 degrees so also USward. On Mon/Fri/Sat on 15285 instead; Wed & Thu on 15270 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** U S A. WORLD OF RADIO 1728 monitoring: awoke just in time to hear the outro at 1129 UT Tuesday July 8 on WRMI 9955 --- atop pulse jamming from CUBA, and yes, still with low audible heterodyne from France in Chinese via TAIWAN at 11-13. As for the new broadcast Mondays at 2100 on 15770, I had misinterpreted Jeff`s notice which really said it would end at 2130. Next:
Wednesday 0630 & 1430 on Hamburger Lokalradio, 7265-CUSB
Wednesday 1315 on WRMI 9955 (after the CCCCI is over)
Wednesday 2100 on WBCQ 7490v
(Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** U S A. 5085, July 8 at 0503, open carrier/dead air with some hum from WTWW-2 instead of broadcasting The Overcomer Ministry. I keep rechecking this when I can, and find the same situation at: 0549, 0621, 0753, 1142, 1204, 1256, 1300. At 1355 it`s down to a JBA carrier maybe with modulation at imagination level? At 1408, has switched to 9930 for VG daytime signal, but still dead air! Meanwhile, 5830 was running OK with SFAW before 1400, 9475 afterwards.

Next check at 1708: 9930 is **still** dead air. Is no one at Lebanon axually listening to it? 9475 is on with SFAW, but both weak rather than huge daytime signals, like still maintained by WWCR with BS on 9980. 12105 is however on with VG signal, the extra PPP sermon hour.

One wonders how much longer Brother Stair will keep on WTWW with treatment like this. Does he know not to pay for such multi-hour outages?

Ted Randall doesn`t know how fortunate he was to keep me on WTWW and thus dissuade me from being publicly judgmental about the sorry state of the station under his control. I didn`t say anything about this on the air; I just reported the facts in DXLD as anyone else could have monitored them, without ridiculing or denouncing like I do with the dregs of shortwave broadcasting, China with all its jamming, and Cuba with even more jamming, and incompetence in carrying out its own broadcasts.

It was George McClintock who conceived the station, acquired the used transmitters, installed them, put them on the air, arranged large deals with ministries to fill huge amounts of airtime (and now there is a fourth transmitter in storage, acquired from KNLS Alaska, but its fate is uncertain --- activation or parts to keep the others going?).

It was also George who arranged for WORLD OF RADIO to have two airtimes from the outset on transmitter #1. Somehow, employee Ted has wrested operational control of WTWW from George and among other things crossed over to get WOR off #1 as well as #2; it seems to be a matter of his sucking up to the real owner of the station, Scriptures for America.

Now all the SNAFUs are squarely Ted`s responsibility, like the latest, letting #2 run for hours and hours (more than 12 so far) with no modulation on 5085/9930. Anyhow, it`s on the air, which was not the case for a good many days previously, as he apparently is unable to keep all three transmitters going reliably; they are used and old, constantly needing maintenance, replacement parts, and if they are on air, not necessarily with any modulation. Quite a sad situation.

In fairness(?) to Ted, he apparently felt that by reporting what I monitored about WTWW, I was ungrateful for his allegedly publicizing WOR to the ham radio community, many of whom he said were unaware of it (despite our having been on air over 30 years! but not for those only tuning the ham bands) (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** U S A. 750, July 8 at 0559 UT, for the second night, WSB in the clear with no KAMA QRM from El Paso TX. It could be back to legal night power of 1 kW but only to the west, rather than still STA non-direxional but on illegal day power of 10 kW instead of requested and authorized 250 watts (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

This report dispatched at 1735 UT July 8