** ARGENTINA [non]. 9395, Nov 17 at 0200:30, RAE ATTW opening English giving the produxion date as Thursday Nov 16, so it`s on time. Previous hour carried VORW, and ID at hourtop (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGST)
** BIAFRA [non]. 11530, Nov 16 at 1858, another check for R. Biafra via WRMI – OFF the air, no signal past 1903 and at 1923 recheck. Yesterday was on but music fill instead. At least we have the recording I made on Sunday. Has it been canceled? NO:
Other scheduled broadcast is at 0500-0600, so I check that on Nov 17 from 0509 for the rest of the hour: VOB is back on 11530 in English, S7-S9, and a weaker 7240 via France. (By comparison, WRMIBS 11580 is S2-S3.) It appears to be the same programming as originally heard Nov 12 and 13: ``Radio Biafra, broadcasting from London``, YL and OM alternately repeating the SW schedule multiple times, every few minutes: 05-06 7240 & 11530, 19-20 11530. They never mention sites such as France and Florida.
But there is a slight change: at 0510, the OM version adds another frequency for the 8 pm (19z) broadcast, 9520 (not 100% sure but after 3 or 4 times, I think that`s it, or maybe 9530). Latest HFCC Nov 17 does not show anything on either during that hour. Will it be WRMI too or somewhence else? Will 11530 still be off? MUST check for 9520 at 1900 Nov 17. YL also repeats the text number for reception reports. At 0530, I give 11530 a generous rating of SINPO 25322.
7240 is hard to match for sure to 11530 and may not be synchronized, separate playout and/or satellite delay. At 0550 there is a het about 7240.4 but that could be ham rather than jam; then as it fades up slightly, I am hearing a hum much closer to 7240 and wonder if it`s one of the defective Issoudun transmitters.
11530 at 0558 starts playing a song in Spanish, which I assume is WRMI fill after Biafra; 0559:30 Zanotti, and as before, cut off the air before his canned ID can completely utter the e-mail address.
7240 is still on air at 0600 and hummy, altho nothing else is in HFCC schedule.
(7254.94, meanwhile at 0603 Nov 17, Voice of Nigeria is much huger, S9+30 in Hausa; BTW, VON is obviously biased against Biafra, nothing in Igbo, per WRTH, Fulfulde their only other African language, not even Yoruba!). (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** CHINA. 11790, Nov 17 at 0038, CRI, or whatever they are calling it now, English interview about China and Austria, good signal, just like // 11885. Both are via Xi`an, 190 and 200 degrees respectively. Graylinish, could be longpaths. BTW, I visited the Xi`an site on my one trip to China, but they wouldn`t let me thru the gate (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** CUBA. 11760, Nov 16 at 1924, RHC in big carrier of dead air. This frequency is supposed to close at 1900 after being the only one filling the 16-19 UT gap. Something`s always wrong at RHC. Still so at 1947, while 15140 is in Creole (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** CUBA. 9535, Nov 17 at 0100, RHC Spanish in full frequency announcement, including closing 6000 & 11950, without clarifying that those have been the separate Mesa Redonda TV soundtrack; I`m not paying close attention, but at the end, a fourth FM frequency has been added, for Cienfuegos. I think it ends in .9. Check the website,
http://radiohc.cu/interesantes/frecuencias
Of course not! It`s still the *A-16* schedule with outdated SW frequencies, let alone FM. Arnie had said plans were to expand RHC coverage on FM to the entire island. At this rate, it`ll take many2 years. It`s never been clear how the various languages fit into the FM schedules, if any beyond Spanish. There must be some English, since they plug the FMs in that language (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** CUBA [and non]. 6165, Nov 17 at 0611, RHC English undermodulated, making it worse vs the CCI producing a slow SAH of 32v per minute. HFCC shows the understation at 0600-0630 is NHK Arabic to the SE from FRANCE. Arnie was itching to get back on good ol` 6165, but participants in HFCC have also registered what amount to other collisions: 0020-0320 Spanish back toward Cuba from Iran; 0430-0500 NHK Russian via Germany (but never mind the imaginary Voice of Russia in Russian from St. Pete with 800 kW! at 0100-0600 also back toward America. Hmm, wonder if that entry was really to ``protect`` 6165 for the Cuban boycotter of HFCC?) (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** CUBA. 11935-11970, Nov 17 at 1335, RHC 11950 is splattering out to this range. // 11840 along with its clear but weaker parasites 11830 & 11840 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** EGYPT. 9570, Nov 16 at 1936, S3-S5 of dead air, lite whine, maybe JBM. Of course, it`s Cairo`s hour in ``German`` (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** ERITREA. 7140, Nov 17 at 1340, JBA carrier, presumed Voice of the Broad Masses of Eritrea, by longpath. Much weaker than 7120 Hargeisa, or 7205 if that`s Sudan; and other VOBME INTRUDER, 7181+ not audible amid hams. But by 1349 I can make out its JBA carrier on 7181.552.
The long path route from Asmara to Enid goes across the entire Indian Ocean, well south of Australia, just missing the southern tip of New Zealand, across the entire Pacific, entering North America around La Paz. Full-daytime short path would be across France, Atlantic and Labrador. Distancefromto.net shows short path is 12.7 Megameters or 7.9 kilomiles. Subtracting from approx. 40 Mm or 24.9 kmi circumference, we get: 27.3 Mm, or 17 kmi LP (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** ETHIOPIA. 7236.13v to 7236.16, Nov 17 at 1342, S6-S9 carrier varying constantly down and up as I try to measure it, trace of modulation, surely R. Ethiopia by longpath; the 40m Eritrean frequencies also in, q.v. (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** MEXICO. 6185, Nov 17 at 0610, dead air at S9, XEPPM still not turned off after end of programming circa 0600 now (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** OKLAHOMA [non]. 7490, check WBCQ UT Sat Nov 18 at 0400-0500 for `Broad Spectrum Radio`, as per their new schedule, our only chance to hear it not quite in the middle of the night vs WRMI scheduling. Seems strange, as WBCQ has long carried `Financial Survival` during this hour, UT Tue-Sat and still shows on their schedule, no BSR.
Or rather, the BSR website has been changed since I last quoted it; showing current date Nov 17 and time:
http://broadspectrumradio.com/about-bsr/shortwave-radio-schedule/bsr-international-shortwave-broadcasts/
Now WRMI is NOT mentioned, and times on WBCQ and Channel 292 are TBA!
(Glenn Hauser, Enid, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** SOUTH CAROLINA [non]. 11600, Nov 16 at 1945, Alex Scourby pontificating a Bible, an echo behind 11825 WRMI, i.e. The Overkiller Ministry, soon into BS himself; poor S2-S4, with RTTY QRM from 11595 avoided by USB tuning; but why in this doomed world bother? BULGARIA has reserved this frequency for one minute less than 24 hours; Kurdistan also on the HFCC books via KCH Moldova, currently not in use (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** U K. 3950-3955-3960, Nov 17 at 0606, DRM noise causing hams to avoid the span, but one on 3963-LSB; it`s BBCWS in English, this hour only, 100 kW, 114 degrees from Woofferton per HFCC. I thought DRM transmissions deliberately reduced power to a sizable fraxion (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** U S A. 15740, Nov 16 at 1927, S9+20 of open carrier, tho nothing scheduled here. I figure it`s VOA Greenville warming up for 15730 to start at 1930; yes, rather at 1929:24* it cuts off and jumps to 15730 which is already on by the time I get there. 1930 brings up French modulation as ``VOA Afrique, Le Monde Aujourd`hui``, without any sign-on or English ID, but joining in progress.
The warmup-on-another-frequency tactic is oft employed by IBB when necessary to avoid QRMing itself; in this case, 15730 has already been on for an hour of French, but via Vatican, violating Separation of Church & State. (And reverts to SMG for another semihour from 2030 on weekends; why? It`s not like there aren`t plenty of idle GB senders) (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** U S A [and non]. WORLD OF RADIO 1904 monitoring: confirmed Thursday November 16 at 2230.5 on WRMI 5850, good. Modulation does not start until 2230.0 with Okeechobee song ID. NOT confirmed UT Fri Nov 17 at 0030 on WBCQ, 9330v-CUSB --- yet again no signal detectable now nor at 0058 recheck, when 9265 WINB is good, 9370 WWRB is VG, and 7490v WBCQ is poor.
I asked WBCQ last week if something was wrong at their end, but no reply. As the northernmost USA SW station except for KNLS, it`s most vulnerable to auroral zone attenuation or even blackouts. Too bad they are not using 3265v, which would survive much better than the highers.
BTW, No one mentions it, but I must apologize for a number of upcut/glitches, particularly toward the end of WOR 1904. This happens when I am in too big a hurry and don`t wait another beat or two after unpausing my recording as I make an edit. This time, that even missed the callsign of the station I was talking about moving from 5050 to 3215, which of course was WWRB. Next:
Sat 0030 WBCQ 9330v-CUSB to WSW
Sat 0729 HLR 6190-CUSB to WSW
Sat 1531 HLR 7265-CUSB to WSW
Sat 2030v WA0RCR 1860-AM ND
Sat 2230 WBCQ 9330v-CUSB to WSW
Sat 2300 WRMI 11580 to NE
Sun 0200 WRMI 11580 to NE
Sun 0410v WA0RCR 1860-AM ND
Sun 1130 HLR 9485-CUSB to WSW
Mon 0030 WBCQ 9330v-CUSB to WSW
Mon 0400v WBCQ 5130v Area 51 to WSW
Mon 0430 WRMI 9955 to SSE
Tue 0030 WBCQ 9330v-CUSB to WSW
Tue 0030 WRMI 7730 to WNW
Tue 2030 WRMI 11580 to NE, 9455 to WNW, 7780 to NE [or 1905?]
(Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** U S A. 9395 // 9455, Nov 17 at 0725, WRMI Oldies channels now amid floating VOA News relay, about Zimbabwe, both good this night (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** U S A. 17775, Nov 16 at 1931, barely audible music about S6 same as background noise level, from KVOH. There are huge variations in reception here at about 1100 miles, sometimes blasting in, sometimes like this or even JBA carrier (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** U S A. 11520, Nov 17 at 0036, WEWN English is VG, S9+35 and even splattering. Very unusual, but later into the night we can expect it to become JBA: is it running until 0900, or 1200, in the absence of registered NF 9470 at 09-12? (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** U S A. 12000-12030 and 12110-12120 approx., Nov 17 at 1332, spike splatter matching modulation peaks on 12065 WEWN English which is very strong. Worst around 12010 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** U S A. 750, Nov 17 at 1303 UT, USA Radio News, roughly E-W, which means not KMMJ, but surely not WSB either, a major station with a minor network? and rather late for it at sunrise here. I might guess KBNN Lebanon MO, but NRC AM Log shows the USA affiliate is KOAL Price UT (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** U S A. 870, Nov 17 at 1311 UT, DJ mixing English with some S Asian? language, also playing snippets of S Asian songs, but just can`t stop his doubletalk. Roughly N/S, surely KFJZ Fort Worth TX in its latest incarnation, and shortly losing out to WWL still propagating (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** UZBEKISTAN. 5855 & 5875, Nov 17 at 1322, open carriers, at S6-S9 and S5-S8 respectively, somethings warming up for 1330 broadcasts.
5855 at 1329 Nov 17 refers to BBCWS.com, 1330 into tonal language.
5875 at 1329 Nov 17 into atonal language, with recognizable BBCWS theme music.
HFCC shows both are 100 kW, 131 degrees from Tashkent, 5855 at 1330-1415 in Myanmarianese, 5875 at 1330-1400 in Bengali (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
UNIDENTIFIED. Trans-Pacific JBA MW carrier search, on the handheld, altazimuth wrist-mounted DX-398, Nov 17 at 1253-1300 UT: 774-NW, 828-NW, 882-?, 1035-WSW, 1098-W (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
This report despatched at 1837 UT November 17
