** ALBANIA [non]. 5850, Jan 25 at 2300.5, WRMI relay of R. Tirana has been reactivated, as expected, after at least two weeks of absence, VG signal as always here, better than it ever was direct. IS, theme and sign-on in English does not mention any SW, just via an internet address! Perhaps because the relay is somewhat unofficial but tolerated. 2318 in a feature about Byzantine art.
5850, again Jan 26 at 2300.5, R. Tirana with another program they don`t acknowledge is on any SW transmitter (and is so tnx to our efforts, not the management); previewing topix Press Review and Profile later after news about domestic politix. This is daily except Sundays (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** ARGENTINA [non]. 9395, Jan 25 at 1946, WRMI poor signal, still with World Music (sounds Japanese), instead of RAE in German; also WM until at least 2100 instead of RAE Italian. At 1946, 9455 was in Oldies. While 11530, R. Herwa International, much better with an S9+10 signal.
9395 is also supposed to carry the RAE English hour from 0200, but Jan 26 it`s inaudible, while 9455 is a JBA carrier.
9395, Jan 26 chex between 19 and 21, *still* no RAE in German, Italian via WRMI, but World Music variety. If a song is in German or Italian, it`s only coincidental. See also USA: WRMI (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** AUSTRALIA. 5045 and slightly stronger 5055, Jan 26 at 1140, JBA carriers from Ozy Radio and 4KZ (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** BOUVET ISLAND [and non]. QRX for the 3Y0Z DX-pedition which hasn`t arrived yet. This map shows they were less than halfway to Bouvet from Punta Arenas, Chile, passing South Georgia on Jan 24:
https://dx-world.net/3y0z-bouvet-2018/
Since they departed PA on Jan 19, it`s unclear how they ever expected to reach BI by Jan 23. At this rate it should take another 6 days, like Jan 30-31. Original departure date of Jan 13? was delayed without notice.
Bruce Churchill, USN Ret., says on the DXLD yg, ``And that is one of the scariest places in the world to be on the water in a small boat``
Jari Savolainen, Finland, another mariner, replies, ``Well, Betanzos isn't actually "a small boat". It's not a huge passenger liner but anyway about 1400 gross tons and some 65 meters long. Has been in use since 1974 and described as fish factory/trawler/cargo ship. According to Fleetmon AIS-info, the ship has sent their ETA (estimated time of arrival) being Bouvet 2018-01-29 at 1600 UT``
Also got this from another Finn, Br Jari (OH1EB) Kulkki, Jan 26:
``Glenn, Bouvet is not active yet, still few days to go. There has been big pileups for Kosovo (Z60A) which you probably heard on 14200 kHz. The station Z60A was transmitting on 14195 and listening 5-10 up. ARRL has changed the rules and Kosovo is now added to DXCC list. What is the status of Kosovo in BC countries list? They have one MW station on 549 kHz`` (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** CANADA. 6070-, Jan 26 at 0210, JBA carrier; is CFRX off or hit by propagation disturbance? NDXC/Aoki shows only one other 6070 on air at this time, in fact 24 hours like CFRX: R. Capital in Rio de Janeiro, which of course has been dead for years, fortunately for CFRX listeners. By 0703, CFRX is reaudible with news on ``News-Talk 10-10`` (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** CUBA. 15370-AM, Jan 26 at 1540 check, another blessèd day without the constellation of RHC FM spurs all over the 19m band. Bet they`re back in force in a day or two (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** ETHIOPIA. 7237.085, Jan 26 at 1517, VP carrier, presumed R. Ethiopia, which varies widely in this area. Also JBA carriers presumed also long-path regular neighbors, 7205 Sudan, 7181+ & 7140 Eritrea, 7120 Somaliland (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** HAWAII. 5000, Jan 26 at 1143, WWVH with a special announcement this minute, can`t copy clearly, but seems about plans to curtail some service, marine weather? Ends with ``Aloha``, and again at 1144, repeat or part 2. 1145 the hourly propagation outlook, starting with solar flux at 70. Weak and under less weak WWV; also audible on 2500.
On Jan 3, Mark Coady, Ont., reported to ODXA: ``According to the NIST website, WWVH on 5000 is at reduced power (2.5 vs. normal 10 kW) due to a transmitter fault`` (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** MEXICO [and non]. 6185.017, Jan 26 at 1513, very weak signal, but I can tell it is in Spanish, which means it has to be XEPPM, on the air far earlier than supposedly scheduled from 2300 or 0000. Also others have measured it slightly off+plus. There is another weaker signal, perhaps the 15 kW China Huayi, or the 500 kW Voice of Turkey in Italian (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** ROMANIA. 11975, Jan 26 at 1526, disco-beat music at S7 to S9+10, // 9810 at S9-S8. RRI is in Romanian at 1400-1557 on both from Galbeni 300 kW, 285 and 290 degrees, good enough for us (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** SAUDI ARABIA. 13710.014, Fribbath Jan 26 at 1537, BSKSA Qur`an, S9+10/20.. Not unusual for them to be slightly off-frequency, enough for pitch to stick out in 1 kHz step BFO tuning (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** U S A. 1790-CW, Jan 26 at 0254, another attempt to copy the test message from WH2XDE/3. It`s tough as the signal is fading up and down a lot, up only at brief spurts allowing an occasional letter, number or symbol to be copied here and there. After a considerable pause, the sequence always starts with VVV VVV (and another VVV?). Several times I get the /3, but not the full experimental call. Also WAYLAND, the Massachusetts town which is suburb on the west side of Boston. Also QSL K2ORS. SK at the end. Starts over around 0300 and 0303. It`s a little better at 0633 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** U S A [and non]. WORLD OF RADIO 1914 monitoring: confirmed Thursday January 25 after 2230.5 on WRMI 5850, VG S9+20. Not confirmed UT Fri Jan 26 at 0030 on WBCQ, 9330v-CUSB: no signal audible. Not confirmed UT Sat Jan 27 at 0030 on WBCQ, 9330v-CUSB but there is a JBA carrier, even weaker than the JBACs on 9265, 9395, 9455. Hey, US SW stations, just maybe the 9 MHz band is not suitable after dark under current propagation conditions. Next:
Sat 0729 HLR 6190-CUSB to WSW
Sat 1531 HLR 6190-CUSB to WSW
Sat 2030v WA0RCR 1860-AM ND
Sat 2230 WBCQ 9330v-CUSB to WSW
Sat 2300 WRMI 7780 to NE
Sun 0200 WRMI 7780 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, 9455 to WNW
Tue 0030 WBCQ 9330v-CUSB to WSW
Tue 0030 WRMI 7730 to WNW
Tue 2030 WRMI 7780 to NE, 9455 to WNW [or #1915?]
Full WOR schedule via all media, podcast access:
http://www.worldofradio.com/radioskd.html
(Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** U S A. 9395, Jan 25 at 2143, WRMI is not broadcasting `The Power Hour` as scheduled, rather Oldies music; 2144 ID by Bob Biermann, into VOA News by Ann Ball, but within about one and one third minutes, she is interrupted by the BB ID again, and ``All We Need is Love``, back to Oldies instead of the rest of VOA news, let alone TPH.
9395, Jan 26 at 2100, this WRMI morphs from World Music replacing RAE relays, to join GCN network opening `The Power Hour Nation` with Mary Ellen --- in for Daniel ---, who will be back from vacation on Monday. First 5.5 minutes she vamps with plugs for their mall and what`s coming up; paranoid conspiracy-laden program underway past 2112 tune-out, but at 2158, this and // 7780 which I can now hear, are winding up an Oldies hour, 2159 BB ID, 2200 ``more music in a minute`` after own commercial, 2201 back to music. It seems that the M-F 21-23 block which is supposed to be radiating TPH is instead dumping out of it sometime during the first semihour, presumably mis-programming by mistake, and when that happens, these transmitters default to Oldies.
BTW, Richard Langley reports this to the DXLD yg about Bob Biermann as monitored Jan 21:
``Bob Biermann's Your Weekend Show was quite interesting with the first half hour about the mechanics of the Hawaii missile alert fiasco and the second half about our use of our time and how we sometimes waste it. It was so interesting, I just had to listen to the rest of it on line! He also mentioned that he is changing his program a bit (and moving back to Florida) and also considering additional shortwave broadcasts. Virtually no evangelizing in this episode``
He had moved to a retreat in the ``mountains`` of north Georgia to take on a pastorate (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** U S A. 5950, Jan 26 at 1212, this always weak WRMI to the south, has guy singing The Lord`s Prayer, but not the usual Protestant tune, in English, then apparently Hebrew, mentions Yeshua, cites Micah in English. Scheduled Fri 1200-1230 is Yeshua Messiah Ministry, and several other times and frequencies. This block other days of week contains DX programs, except Saturday `Trova Libre`, Cuban music (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** U S A. 7780, Jan 26 at 1524, WRMI music is jazzy, and not // 9395 & 9455, the latter certainly Oldies. So what program is on 7780? Maybe World Music, or a different playout of Oldies? (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** U S A. 9455 // stronger 9955, WRMI Fri Jan 26 at 2202, `Noches con Mirka` live-sounding chat, music and audience, seems to be the Xmas (or was it pre-New Year) special which consumed a sesquihour instead of usual unihour. Goes on to review what happened in 2017y, a bit stale by now. It seems that whenever there is a pre-emptive schedule change for some special, it`s likely to stick for week(s) rather than reverting to normalcy (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** VATICAN. 9660, Jan 25 at 2110, interview in Portuguese about Moçambique. VR direct from SMG, 100 kW at 234 degrees to CIRAF 46W, which means the west coast of West Africa, where the only possible targets would be Cabo Verde & Guiné-Bissau; but also good for Brasil just beyond (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
UNIDENTIFIED. 774, Jan 26 at 1130, JBA carrier on R75 with E/W longwire, so no DF; could be Australia or Japan (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
UNIDENTIFIED. 1710, Jan 26 at 1135 UT, soft strumming music I have heard here before, from Retén lo que Tienes, Bâton Rouge LA? Now there is a second weaker station with vocal music, no doubt both pirates, but what is the other one? (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
UNIDENTIFIED. 13564.3-CW, Jan 26 at 1533, beacon callsign RF sent continuously with hardly any pause between repeats. Compared to 13564.0, my keyboard puts it at F-natural above C-middle, i.e. 349 Hz per this reference:
http://pages.mtu.edu/~suits/notefreqs.html
while LWCA list puts it on 13564.33, which would be closer to E-natural. Probably cannot expect that much precision, especially with differing tables of exact music pitch frequencies. Unknown location, but grid EM96 per LWCA list. This time no competition from K6FRC on 13565+, but from wideband CODAR (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
UNIDENTIFIED. 15054.50-USB, Jan 26 at 1542, 2-way in colloquial Spanish; stronger one has severe background noise (from engine?) playing havoc with his vox. Weaker one is clear. Among the words I can recognize are: tiroteo, vuelo, cambio, madre, 2205, viento tras vientos, mareados (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
This report despatched at 0105 UT January 27
