** BELGIUM. 9970 not often heard here, but when it is, has to be RTBF, the frequency`s only occupant at any time, direct from Wavre, not a relay as in the case of VRT. Dec 25 at 1444 a familiar novelty song, 1446 announcement in French (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** INTERNATIONAL WATERS [and non]. Dec 25 at 1417 I started bandscanning 8-9 MHz, which I often skip, lacking broadcasters, but should not. At 1418 I came upon 8122 SSB, where detailed weather info was being given for the Sea of Cortez and vicinity, mainly gales 25-30 kts, 10-12 foot seas tonight. This was by a REAL HUMAN BEING, no robot, a very informal old salt, colorful accent and language, a guy who knows his stuff, making it a meteorology and geography lesson at the same time. He talked continuously until 1434 when he passed it back to ``Lovely Rita``, apparently the NCS with a much weaker signal; her call seemed to end in 796. Turns out this was the Amigo Net, closing until tomorrow afternoon/evening, the speaker having been Don, WBQ557, I thought he said, Oxnard, California. Rita said they were going to QSY to 4149 USB, but Don continued with another contact, also a station he could barely hear in Mazatlán, then discussed the weather outlook for Isabela. I believe I have logged this net before, but can`t find it on that frequency in searching my logs. But he`s really WPXU557, Don Anderson, per schedule I got by a bit of Googling: http://www.pacsea.org/n6hgradio.html (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) Viz.: ** TUNISIA [and non]. I often listen to RTT 7190 around 0630-0700 for its Arab music tho it`s hardly soporific. For the first time on Dec 24 at 0643-0650+ I heard some deliberate QRHam, some guy exactly on frequency as BFO for his SSB counts, ``1, 2, 3, 4, 5; 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, testing…` Never heard him say anything else or ID. This raises an interesting question. Yes, hams in Americas are totally free to use this frequency, but are they totally free to use it in a one-way 5+ minute `test` without ID? Thinly disguised jamming. BTW, Tunisia is not breaking any rules; this transmission per HFCC at 04-08 is 265 degrees to CIRAF 37, which is Algeria and Morocco; it is just bleeding over here, even tho its 500 kW often makes it the best signal inside the 41 mb in OK. Unlike Croatia/Germany, Slovakia, etc., which really do broadcast to Americas inside our 40m hamband (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** U S A. Don`t usually hear WBCQ 17495 on weekday mornings, but there it was Dec 24 at 1445 with GFRN // 9330. Nothing from DVOBurma via Madagascar on 17495 this date (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** U S A. Dimitse Tewahedo started as usual Monday Dec 24 at 1900 on WHRA 11785; they play a lot of music, good value for money? But at 1905 the transmission cut off, abruptly back to WHRA in English, announcing frequency change to 7520! OCS, then claimed they were ``now on 7520`` but really still on 11785 which had just opened 6 minutes earlier. 1907 into WHR English gospel music fill programming; still the same at 1944 recheck. Obviously, some glitch caused the program automation to run the QSY announcement at 1905 instead of 1958. Was there any human oversight to prevent or fix this ASAP? Of course not! Will the Ethiopians get their money back? (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** U S A [non]. The only somewhat unusual signal on 25m, Dec 24 at 1850 was rather muffled talk in unID language, on 11805. Then at 1856 mentions Family Radio, and Oakland. O no, not again. Did not recognize it as Swahili, but listed as such via Madagascar. I am also disappointed that even RNW availablizes its resources to this wacky ministry, seemingly bent on broadcasting via every conceivable SW relay site. This is the 50 kW transmitter aimed 320 degrees for EAf, so not too far from our azimuth too. Note: after 1900 RN uses the same frequency in English, but on much different heading, and via South Africa instead! The least RN could get out of this would be some broadcasts via Okeechobee (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ____________________________________________________________________________________ Looking for last minute shopping deals? Find them fast with Yahoo! Search. http://tools.search.yahoo.com/newsearch/category.php?category=shopping ---[Start Commercial]--------------------- Order your WRTH 2008: http://www.hard-core-dx.com/redirect2.php?id=wrth2008 ---[End Commercial]----------------------- ________________________________________ Hard-Core-DX mailing list [email protected] http://montreal.kotalampi.com/mailman/listinfo/hard-core-dx http://www.hard-core-dx.com/ _______________________________________________ THE INFORMATION IN THIS ARTICLE IS FREE. It may be copied, distributed and/or modified under the conditions set down in the Design Science License published by Michael Stutz at http://www.gnu.org/licenses/dsl.html
