** AUSTRALIA. 11660 with bad collision between RA in English at 2137 Oct 4 and something a bit weaker in French. That would be CRI at 2030-2230, 500 kW, 308 degrees via Kashgar, East Turkistan, to Europe. While RA is at 20-22, 100 kW, 70 degrees toward Pacific. Thus both are also aimed USward beyond their stated targets (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** AUSTRALIA. VL8 on 120m heard here for the first time this season, 2485 with English talk at the late hour of 1308 Oct 5, about half an hour after sunrise, very poor in noise; could only detect carriers on 2325, 2310 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** AUSTRIA. R. Austria International, domestic relay on 6155, still has token English news capsule, at least on weekdays, heard Monday Oct 5 in progress at 0609 after German, probably started during 0608, with items about N Korea, Save the Children, Sumatera rescuers giving up, coalition talx in Germany, Austrian foreign minister to Moscow, Austria to preside over UN Security Council, very brief weather forecast, 0611 introducing equally token news in French. I had previously remarked that English was at 0508, but 0608 is correct DST time, 0708 in winter. These are presumably what get repeated starting 13 minutes into mostly-Austro-German broadcasts the rest of the day (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** BRAZIL. 25m Brazilians were making it in nightmiddle UT Oct 5: 11925, R. Bandeirantes, at 0600, non-religious speaker in monolog pontificating about Brasil; but better signal on 11815 from R. Brasil Central, Goiânia, at 0601 with full ID, ZY-callsigns, and asserting 7 and a half kilowatts on this frequency, jingle ID, and announcer Célio Silva on duty until 4 am (0700 UT; DST of UT-2 starts in this and most south/easterly parts of Brasil on Oct 18, per timeanddate.com). There was also a het on 11895, probably off-frequency Brazilian vs Spain, but nothing on 11780, which is on the air overnight only on UT Sundays. On 31m, the best Brazilian was 9675, at 0604 about equal level to WYFR 9680, sounds like religious catechism, but by 0615 WYFR had weakened, audiblizing 9675 better, now with singing, still distorted modulation, 0621 full ID Rádio Canção Nova on the air 24 hours, plus various slogans, IDs in passing again and again, and promoing website http://www.cancaonova.com/ which strangely enough does not say anything about SW, just AM, FM and TV! Music did not resume until 0624. I assume the name alludes to a `new song` being sung by those allegedly saved from damnation (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** BULGARIA [and non]. As outpointed before, R. Bulgaria usage of 15700 in Bulgarian has a one-hour gap at 1400, which Deutsche Welle has taken advantage of for its Russian service via Woofferton UK. But they still overlap. Oct 5 at 1459, DW Russian had a tone test and SAH from Bulgaria interfering with it, but DW (or VTC) cut off its modulation in mid-sentence about 1459:30. At 1500 RB opening theme was barely audible with a roar and since the SAH was gone, assume it was purely a Plovdiv problem (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** CHINA. Firedrake Oct 5 at 1306: equally fair on 8400, 9000 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** CUBA. For a few months, the secret third airing of RHC`s Spanish DX program En Contacto had been at about 2240 UT Sundays, more than an hour earlier than before. But Oct 4 I found it back closer to its original time, in progress at 2148, with the voice of none other than Alen Grájam, the SS clone of Allen Graham of HCJB. He was being interviewed by contributor Rubén Guillermo Margenet, whose home he recently visited in Rosario, Argentina. Just as I tuned in, AG mentioned that HCJB was broadcasting via WRMI! Imagine that, WRMI being mentioned on RHC, comrade to the archenemy DentroCuban Jamming Command which blasts away against 9955 not only when in Spanish but when in English. But En Contacto is one of RHC`s least political shows. Allen said that he was born in Kansas, and then moved to California before exiting the country to become a missionary. Admitted that most Cubans would no longer be able to hear HCJB as it exits shortwave, since they don`t have much internet access, (least of all broadband). HCJB will instead see what it can arrange in various LA countries to be heard on local FM (not including Cuba, for sure). 2153 next feature on EC was para los principiantes, too basic explanation of direxional antennas, for SW transmission. Must have started circa 2141, since end was at 2156.6, then RHC ID as transmitting for N, C and S America and the Mediterranean area. 2157 next program, Cuba Campesina, that wonderful music show. Frequency observations: synchronized on 11760, 11770, 13790 and 5965; an echo apart on 13760 and 6000 which were synchronized with each other. No signals where they might also have been, 11800, 17660. Here`s RHC`s complete program schedule in Spanish http://www.radiohc.cu/espanol/c_programacion/programacion.htm which still shows no details at 21-23 UT Sundays, only Revista Iberoamericana, a grab-bag which includes repeats of real shorter programs such as En Contacto. One can refer to the full schedule for some other titles likely to be less politically charged than e.g. Voces de la Revolución. The resumed En Contacto time, this week anyway, is also news to José Bueno, who circulates weekly promotions for several DX programs in Spanish, still showing this as 2242, and also included a frequency abandoned months ago, 11820. O, that`s not all! UT Monday Oct 5 at 0550 as I made my nightly check to see which language was on 6140, there was En Contacto again re-interviewing Allen Graham, at a completely new/unscheduled time, ending at 0558, so started about 0543. Is RHC Spanish going to a 2-hour repeat cycle now like English? That would lead to many more airings. Last overt time for show was 0135 UT Monday. At 0550 // 6000 which was much stronger than usual; have they switched antennas and/or transmitters around too? Not only WWCR, but also RHC bothered by squealing transmitters, Oct 5 at 0607 on 6060 in English about a trova composer; and Oct 5 at 1452 on 13780 in Spanish. Then the RHC leapfrog on 13880 was getting QRM from clicking on 13882, suspect a spur from the DentroCuban Jamming Command blasting away against Martí 13820; how apropos. This clicker also rode a full carrier, making a het with 13880 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** ECUADOR. See UNIDENTIFIED 11960 ** INDIA. 11620, AIR GOS at this hour free of QRM from Spain, Oct 4 at 2138, W&M conversation over lite hum/buzz, good signal but with transpolar flutter. Try as I might to get something out of it, despite listening for almost ten minutes, I could not figure out what the subject was, due to their heavy accents, not helped by the flutter and hum. From the tone of it, may have been something deeply reflective and/or philosophical. I would say copy was at best 20% as far as recognizable words, including one complete phrase, ``quality is not good enough``. I agree! (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** INDIA. Tnx to Alok Dasgupta in Kolkata for confirming identity of the extremely distorted blob I had heard after 1320 on 9485 one day, 9432 the next, as indeed AIR National Service via Aligarh which is supposed to be on 9470, and which I had also found strangely missing. He had been tracking it a few days; on Oct 2 it was 9505, and notified AIR engineering about the problem which they are supposedly striving to solve. The same transmitter also ails when attempting to use other 31m channels during the daytime. So I look for it again Oct 5 at 1323, and now find it centered on 9500, still extremely distorted but this time with sufficient musical copy to match it with Bengaluru on 9425. It spread from 9495 to 9515, and especially disrupted a station on 9510, i.e. VOA in English via Thailand. AIRblob was considerably weaker later but still audible on 9500 at 1506. During that hour VOA Spe-cial Eng-lish is on 9485, well heard today but must also have been blasted by the blob when it was residing around 9485. Then at 1513, 9425 AIR music seemed to have a low het upon it, but then I decided it was just the drone (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** INDONESIA. 4750, RRI Makassar, peaking S9+8 on meter, but still only poor reception in noise, Oct 5 at 1317 with music and Indo talk. 4925, RRI Jambi presumed, at same time 1317 Oct 5 was peaking S9, with vocal music, flutter unlike far lower-latitude-path from Makassar. Music still audible at 1330, surely nearing fadeout. Bothered by SSB on the low side, more so than by a carrier on 4920, India or Tibet. Jambi is a tough catch here; Ron Howard in California and Luca Botto Fiora in Italy each independently have noted much stronger signals on 4925 since the earthquake, and Jambi is of interest as the closest active SW station to Padang. However, propagation is also improving, and I don`t see how they could turn up the power significantly on such a 10 kW transmitter --- unless the quake jostled something favorably, or they had deliberately been running it on reduced power until then (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** INDONESIA. VOI, 9525.9, Oct 5 at 1323 was registering S9+10 with flutter, YL in English, music, but very low modulation. Ignored during the 14 clash hour with CRI in Russian; but this date VOI stayed on air well past 1500 for the English hour repeat, instead of cutting off rudely a few minutes after starting. At 1506 news in progress, 1511 ending with headlines. No QRM now and almost readable now despite undermodulation, but then switched to OM speaker and his voice was unreadable. Kept an ear on the carrier, however, to see how long it would stay on --- still there at 1518, 1525, 1530, 1535, 1542 when I quit (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** ISRAEL. When you hear an odd-pitched het other than 5 kHz between adjacent stations, you know someone is off-frequency, and that was the case Oct 5 at 1406 when BBC Arabic on 15790 via Cyprus had a less than 5 kHz beat from the next station down, Galei Tsahal, of course, measured on 15785.9 with a Russian-sounding vocal musical quartet (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** LIBYA. 17725, news in English at 1436 Oct 5, items about Pakistan, FAO, YL ``ending the news from Voice of Africa``, fanfare from produxion music album, fair signal at best (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** NEW ZEALAND. RNZI Mailbox, caught part of it Monday Oct 5 at 1335 on 6170, and the rest of it from audio on demand. Adrian Sainsbury explained like he did last year about why RNZI has a transition schedule effective for only one week: Seasonal changes require changes to antenna system. Oct 25 falls in middle of a ``labor holiday weekend`` in NZ, so need to make changes earlier, as it`s not practical to get staff to Rangitaiki during the holiday weekend. So to be off the air Oct 16 from 11:30 am NZT for about 6 hours [2230 UT Oct 15 to 0430 UT Oct 16], and not implement the full B-09 schedule until Oct 25, which cannot be done before then since some frequencies are occupied by other stations until 25 Oct. The new sked from 25 Oct will be posted on website sometime this week, he says. How inconvenient! NZ ought to change its holiday to another weekend so as not to disrupt RNZI`s scheduling. Or, what`s this nothing- interferes-with-holiday mentality? The individuals concerned could celebrate their holiday time off a week before or after instead, and avoid all the crowds, highway congestion? to boot. See also PHILIPPINES (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** PHILIPPINES. Whilst listing to RNZI Mailbox on 6170, Oct 5 at 1335 there was a constant het on the hi side, about 6170.3 and becoming a bit annoying; surely PBS - R. Magasin DZRM, as reported by Ron Howard, CA, and Bryan Clark, NZ on 6170.4 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** ROMANIA. 11895, VG signal S9+20 playing segués of country/rock tunes in English, Oct 5 at 1532. Hmmm, another VOA Greenville test on a frequency used later at 2100 in Creole? No, at 1539 into announcement in Romanian, i.e. RRI at 15-16 via Galbeni. They must be hard-up for real Romanian programming if they have to play such off-topic stuff to fill the time (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** RUSSIA. VOR, 12040, in English Oct 5 at 1519 discussing how to celebrate the space age (Sputnik anniversary being Oct 4), and concluded that a Space Week Oct 4-10 would be more appropriate than anything associated with July 20-21, 1969, ``unjustified``. This was running about 1 second ahead of // 15605 where signal was better. Respective sites listed as ``Serpukhov`` and ``Moskva`` (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** SPAIN. Weekly REE Sephardic service, 15385, Monday Oct 5 at 1423 with IS, 1425 YL opening still imagining she is on ``15325``. If I worked at a radio station, I would at least have enough interest to find out what frequencies I was on (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** SWEDEN. 9490 in Swedish, YL in studio interviewing OM on phone, Oct 5 at 0618. Could this be Radio Sweden, direct from Hörby? Yes, scheduled M-F 0600-0700 with 250 kW each at 140 and 240 degrees, i.e. totalling 380 degrees - just kidding (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** U S A [and non]. IBB still doesn`t have its act together to avoid interfering with itself on 17585 at 1430! Oct 5 at 1429:30, Greenville cut off the last quarter of the 2-minute and very well researched Today in History segment, in order to play the Yankee Doodle Dandy sign-off, tho it was a mercifully short version. Why in the world does the operator think that is more important to broadcast than whatever programming continues in progress relentlessly?? Meanwhile, Botswana switched from their tuneup carrier on 17575 to modulate on 17585, so there was an overlap of about 20 seconds of YDD from GB and VOA programming from BOTS. Then the GB carrier stayed on a while longer, but off by 1432. It appears that the concept of stopping one transmitter at a precise time and immediately starting another is too much for them to grasp, or to manage to coördinate. Or maybe one operator gets it, but another on rotating work schedule does not. WINB missing both from 9265 and 13570, Oct 5 at 1452, which was just fine, allowing VOA 13570 São Tomé to be bothered only by CODAR. English was running about one second behind 17585 Botswana, why? 9485, fortunately clear of the AIR blob [see INDIA], Oct 5 at 1505 ending news and starting Spe-cial Eng-lish hour with New Dynamic English, Funxioning in Business; S.E. news to follow at 1530, plus more. At 1513, part of the English lesson was curiously, identifying phrases as French, Spanish and Russian. By now, VOA Tinang, PHILIPPINES, has co-channel QRM underneath in uncertain language, but registered is DW Swahili via Rwanda, and maybe also R. Rossii via Samara (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** U S A. Squeals are showing up again on WWCR and RHC. Oct 5 at 0557, VG DGS signal on 5935 brought with it squeal. Was also audible the mixing product of 5890 leapfrogging over 5935 to land on 5980 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** U S A. WYFR 15(?) meter band signals are normally weakish, so surprised to hear Spanish inbooming S9+20 on 18980 at 1450 Oct 5. This one is supposed to be aimed 142 degrees but I wonder if it was on their opposite 315 degree antenna usward instead? If not, speaks well for the amount of back-radiation the forward antennas are capable of. I was checking the A-09 FCC schedule, which now is in its third version updated Sept 18: http://www.fcc.gov/ib/sand/neg/hf_web/A09FCC03.TXT (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** VENEZUELA [non]. 11680, RNVCI via CUBA, tune-in Oct 5 at 1522 to find it in English with comments about the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, start of the Vietnam War, warning to ``stay alert against The Empire``; I guess they fear US is about ready for another war starting with V, or rather los Chavistas want to stir up such fears. 1525 to music break; 1527 in Spanish with ID and the same laughable schedule they have been announcing for 5+ years, even tho only one hour of it happens to remain in effect, Rio de Janeiro, 17-18 en 17705 --- once you convert the time to UT 20-21, tho never specified that all the times they give are local, not including DST variations. 1528 quoting Chief Seattle on the occasion of Earth Day, still in Spanish. Note: neither Earth Day nor the Gulf of Tonkin affair occurred in October (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) UNIDENTIFIED. Presumed OTH radar clix observed in several spots the morning of Oct 5: at 1332 on 5790-5840 and 5355-5390; at 1353 on 7625-7675; at 1456 on 14900-14925, this one strongest reaching S9+3, and weaker 14375-14400 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) UNIDENTIFIED. 9600.4 --- I am still hearing that intriguing het, 0603 Oct 5 against Bulgaria in French. Still at 0638. It`s hard to separate them, but I think the 9600.4 carrier has some fading, and thus external, and furthermore is not always there (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) UNIDENTIFIED. HCJB had been absent from 11960 since Sept 30, but Oct 5 at 1357 found a very strong S9+18 signal there with a variety of tone tests; no sweeps, but switching to different pitches, including a very low one at 1401 rumbling the speaker cone; mostly open carrier after that until cut off at 1408* with no ID or any announcement. Strongly suspect this was last gasp of a 100 kW transmitter at Pifo, put thru its proof-of-performance paces before dismantling and shipping to Kununurra. If not, someone doubtless covets this wide-open frequency. Nothing on the other former morning channel, 11690 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ### ---[Start Commercial]--------------------- Order your WRTH 2009: http://www.hard-core-dx.com/redirect2.php?id=wrth2009 ---[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
