Here are some of my LW/MW loggings from this year's DXpedition to Murray Harbour North, PEI, Canada. We challenged a 24 hour power outage, winds, and rains at the beginning and end, and major geomagnetic disturbances. Still, we soldiered on, and like my more familiar west coast DXpeditions, there was always the new and wonderful to be shown by a great group of DXers from Toronto and points east and south from there. One couldn't ask for a more collegial group of DXers to share the listening tables. Thanks again, everyone. Check Bruce Conti's BamLog website for more pictures and details! 73, Walt Salmaniw (enroute home to Victoria, in Toronto, ON).
*Listening Waters DXpedition Murray Harbour North, PEI 3 – 10 Nov 2018 * *77.5 GERMANY Mainflingen 50 kW Standard time and frequency station, Nov 4 0146 - Heard at good level with time pips. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *153 ROMANIA Brasov 200 kW SRR Antena Satelor, Nov 4 0147 - Good reception with traditional music. Faded down a bit by 01:57. Perhaps a cochannel weakly in the background. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *540 HUNGARY Solt 2000 kw MR1 Kossuth Radio, Nov 8 2100 - Thanks for Niel W. for alerting me to Kossuth Radio, totally dominating the channel at times well over CBC in Newfoundland cochannel. Distinctive chimes heard first at 20:30, and again twice with the news at the TOH. Many mentions of 'Orban', the right-winged president of the country, including a portion of English (he must be at the EU parliament (?) giving a speech). Checked again at 21:25 and again dominating the channel. Budapest clearly mentioned at 21:27. Continued to 21:30:20 when the transmitter was cut, leaving Newfoundland 100% clear. Nothing special at sign off heard. Could not see the transmitter cut off on the Perseus zoom function, though, but suspect with a new Canadian (Nautel) transmitter, that they were likely right on frequency, as the CBC appears to be, as well. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *540 MOROCCO Sidi Bennour 300 kW SNRT Al Idaa Welayat Janub Darfur, Nov 7 2000 - Clearly heard over local domestic CBC. Arabic sounding and heard on // 595 (the off channel, making it an easy //). (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *540 SPAIN Barcelona 50 kW Onda Cero, Nov 8 2059 - Newfoundland and Hungary dominates this frequency, but just before the TOH, one could hear Spanish numbers, so presumably Spain. Fair copy. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *549 UKRAINE Luch 400 kW First Program Ukrainian Radio, Nov 7 2059 - After a couple of days, Ukraine was back and peaking over Jill FM announcing at 20:47 the end of programming for the day. Instead of the National Anthem, there was a choral version of the spiritual anthem of Ukraine, called 'Molytva za Ukrayinu', or Prayer for Ukraine. First time I've heard this hymn ending programming. Very good, before Jill FM resuming it's dominance. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *549 ALGERIA Sidi Hamadouche 600/300 kW Jil FM, Nov 9 0458 - While probing the overninght recordings, found Algeria's NA on, off course // to 531. Both strong. ID at the TOH following the very lengthy military style NA. Military band, then a vocal version along with the band. Fanfare at TOH. Arabic with mention of 'Jil'. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *549 IRELAND Carrickroe 25 kW Spirit Radio, Nov 3 2002 - At the top of the hour, English dominated....So it's Ireland (quite an Irish accent, besides). Good reception. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *549 IRELAND Carrickroe 25 kW Spirit Radio, Nov 9 0328 - I'm following this frequency of interest in my SDR overnight recordings. Brief 'Spirit Radio' ID at 03:28, followed by longer ID, FM and AM 549 ID after 03:30. MWList has them on 04 - 22 but not the case here! The dominant station on at this time. Modern pop music. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *549 IRELAND Carrickroe 25 kW Spirit Radio, Nov 9 2300 - Absolutely armchair copy at 22:55 with local ads and Spirit Radio ID. Best reception so far, before fading down somewhat, as Jil FM returned. Very pleased with that copy. Then on to 1575 to hear Italy signing off with their NA! A nice way to end our DXpedition to Listening Waters!. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *549 UKRAINE Mykolayiv/Luch 400 kW Ukrainian Radio Persha (1st Program), Nov 3 1955 - Sometimes over, usually under Jill FM at sometimes good+ level. Sports talk, which sounded quite Russian to me, but think in Ukrainian with a lot of Russian terms being used?. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *595 MOROCCO Oujda 50 kW SNRT Al Idaa Al-Watania, Nov 7 2005 - Good reception on this off-channel and // to 540 (under local CBC). (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *675 QATAR Al-Arish 600 kW QMC Radio Qatar, Nov 9 2125 - Very strong with light Arabic vocals by YL initially followed by an OM. In sync with web feed here: http://qatarradio.qa/Live <http://qatarradio.qa/Live> I'm pleased with this one!. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *720 GREENLAND Simiutaq 10 kW KNR- Kalaallit Nunaata Radioa, Nov 9 2106 - Excellent reception in the clear with distinctive Greenlandic talk. Bodes for better northerly conditions this afternoon and evening!. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *783 SYRIA Tartus 300 kW SRTV 1 Dimashk, Nov 6 2223 - While listening to the Spaniard (COPE), I started to hear a cochannel in Arabic. Turned out to be // to the webstream (interesting with a .ru web address: https://ok.ru/live/911714950774 <https://ok.ru/live/911714950774> Seems to have no delay at all, but can take a while to log-on. Good reception. No // noted. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *783 SYRIA Tartus/Besira 300 kW SRTV 1 Dimashk, Nov 9 0003 - Very strong reception with a call-in program in Arabic, and // to webfeed noted in MWList.org. No AM parallels noted, though. Occ fade revealing a jumble of other stations. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *801 SPAIN Multiple stations RNE, Nov 6 2243 - A mess of stations on this channel, none particularly strong. Zooming on the Perseus, I'm seeing 5 stations, and after carefully calibrating, here they are in order of strength: 801.000, 800.990, 800.958, 801.055, and 801.004. Fun to chace carriers. Checking MWList Offsets, these might correspond to: RNE Castellon/Almazora (800.962), RNE Burgos/San Bartolome (800.9903), RNE Lugo/As Arierias (801.0001), IRIB Kashmar (801.0041....the weakest one), and RNE Girona/Campllong (801.050). All perhaps!. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *819 EGYPT Batrah 1000 kW ERTU Al-Barnameg al-Aam, Nov 6 2305 - Almost good level Arabic talk, but unfortunately unable to produce audio out of the link provided on MWList (http://live.sis.gov.eg/live/ <http://live.sis.gov.eg/live/> ). Says it's connected, but no audio. Not much else on frequency that fits. Even better by 23:08 with Arabic vocal. Confirmed by a very loud signal from a Italian remote KiwiSDR. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *828 AZORES Monte das Cruzes 1 kW RDP Acores Antena 1, Nov 8 2015 - Fair, almost good at times with a football play by play. Language seems Portuguese, so a presumed logging. Could not // to 693, nor internet audio feed. After some searching, I found that Sporting is playing Arsenal at the Emirates stadium, so undoubtedly them!. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *837 SPAIN Sevilla, Burgos or La Coruna (50, 5 or 2 kW) COPE, Nov 5 2040 - It's all Spain, all the time this afternoon with the solar disturbed conditions. Very strong, with a marked echo, so presumably at least 2 COPE transmitters, with Sevilla with 50 kW the strongest and most likely here, but another is also clearly audible with a vey slight delay. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *882 UNITED KINGDOM Washford 100 kW BBC Radio Wales, Nov 4 0233 - BBC WS ID at fair to almost good level only. I see that the fellas in Victoria are hearing things well on this frequency,but not sure who they are seeing. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *945 IRAN Dehgolan 100 kW IRIB Radio Kordestan, Nov 3 2030 - Very nice reception with ID for Radio Kordestan. Excellent level. Well over cochannel Arabic sounding station. // to off channel 1476.26 or so (good with 20 kW from Marivan). Other listed // on MWList was 999, but not heard here. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *945 UNITED KINGDOM Bexhill-on-Sea 0.7 kW Smooth Radio, Nov 9 1935 - Fair reception, mostly dominating this channel, with, 'Heard it on the Grapevine', confirmed with ID at 19:38 and playlist on-line. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *963 TUNISIA Tunis 100 kW RTT Radio Tunis Chaine Internationale, Nov 6 2128 - Good reception with songs, 'Oh, what a night', and 'I did it my way' (in French). French chatter between the songs. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *963 TUNISIA Tunis 100 kW RTT Radio Tunis Chaine Internationale, Nov 5 1958 - I was wondering who the German speaker was. Good reception, with mild splatter. It'sTunis (I would not have guessed!). 19:59:30 off, and switched to Bethoveen. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *981 ALGERIA Ouled Fayet 300/100 kW Chaine 2, Nov 5 0504 - Good reception, in fact very good at TOH in presumed Berber. Piano instrumental and other very enjoyable music at 05:06. YL announcer. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *990 SPAIN Bilbao 25 kW/Cadiz 5 kW SER, Nov 6 2100 - 990 is dominated by the CBC Radio 1CBY from Cornerbrook, Newfoundland, but at the TOH, the Spaniards almost dominated with Spanish sports programming. Note 2 sites are listed. No echo noted, however. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1008 HOLLAND Zeewolde 100 kW GrootNieuws Radio, Nov 6 2107 - As Bruce Conti opines, a junk frequency, but at 2100, I hear a monotoned female speaker which does not at all sound Spanish. An hour earlier at 20:00, the Spanish/Canary Island station(s) are definitely audible at weaker level. No signs of them an hour later. At 20:01:45 what sounds a lot like Greek music is briefly heard. I'm thinking this may be ERA from Kerkyra with 50 kW. At 20:03 one can definitely hear Spanish sports play by play. Otherwise the dominant speaker seems to be, 'a happy woman', whom most likely is from GrootNieuws Radio in Dutch. Leaning thowards this one as the most consistent. Poor at 22:00 recheck. Note the Dutch station is listed to close 01 Jan 2019. Checked 20:00 wav file on 3 Nov 2018 when European conditions were much better. Very good reception of the Dutch station, with many ads, mentions of Nederland. Thanks for confirmation of GrootNieuws Radio in a clip submitted to RealDX. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1035 ESTONIA Tartu 100 kW Radio Eli/TWR, Nov 4 0311 - Good reception with Russian religious talk. Very stable signal. Great modulation. Some splatter noted. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1053 SPAIN Zaragoza or Castellon 20 and 5 kW COPE, Nov 5 2106 - Same out of this world experience with both COPE transmitters on same frequency with audio delay on one of them. Overall good+ reception tonight. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1170 SLOVENIA Beli Kriz 15 kW Radio Capodistria, Nov 5 2059 - Very nice ID in Italian, just before the TOH. No sign of Iran, nor UAE today. Did fade down after the TOH revealing several cochannels, but impossible to be sure who they are, and whether TA or domestic. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1170 UAE Al-Dhabbaya 800 kW Sawt Al-Joumhouria, Nov 7 2131 - Excellent reception with modern Arabic chants and drums. Occasionally, Slovenia fades up (Radio Capodistria from Beli Kriz 15 kW) in Italian, but not very often. Very nice reception, as one would expect with 800 kW!. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1179 ROMANIA Bacau/Galbeni 400 kW SRR Radio Romania Actualitati, Nov 4 0229 - Excellent reception with modern rock music. // to internet feed. SER tried to fade up, but not with very much success. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1188 IRAN Tehran 300 kW IRIB Radio Payam, Nov 10 0045 - Often excellent strength with very enjoyable international music. Back to traditional Iranian music at 00:46. Checking their website, this is their morning program. Here's what their website states (at www.radiopayam.ir/ProgramHome/?m=024100 <http://www.radiopayam.ir/ProgramHome/?m=024100> ): At dawn, from ?:?? to ?:?? AM, the dawn with awareness and information approach tries to create a sensory and emotional mood for the night through the use of immortal music and utilizing materials such as anecdotes and prayers of the elders of religion and texts about themselves Thinking in the blessings of God creates a good atmosphere for your audience. The use of rich treasures of prose Persian poetry, proverbs, and proper songs and phrases, and the creation of a spiritual atmosphere for the night-lovers, and ultimately, encouraging them to perform, timely demands.' Very nice, indeed. Not Hungary, as I originally had thought, as not // to webfeed. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1251 HUNGARY 25 kW 2 sites Danko Radio, Nov 3 1953 - Excellent reception with instrumental music. // to webstream and 1116 (thanks, Bruce!). Latter is cochannel, though. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1314 IRAN Ardabil 50 kW IRIB Radio Iran, Nov 9 2030 - Time pips at the BOH noted, and then clearly 'Radio Iran' into the usual NA or such. Mostly under cochannel RNE 5 stations. Fair to good. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1323 UNITED KINGDOM Brighton/Sothwick 0.5 kW Smooth Radio, Nov 9 2049 - Good reception besides the adjacent splatter, with oldies music. No signs of anyone else on frequency. Very good at 20:52. Follow you, Follow me by Genesis at 20:53. Strong! Thanks to Neil Wolfish for immediately IDing it. Not bad for 500 w. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1377 ARMENIA Gavar 500/50 kW TWR Asia, Nov 3 2053 - Often very strong in Arabic (as listed in MWList), with cochannel below nominal which is Iran (OM vs YL from Armenia). Faded as we're approaching TOH. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1386 LITHUANIA Viesintos 150 kW Radio Baltic Waves International, Nov 3 2017 - Very strong reception with Radio Liberty programming in Belorusssian. Adjacent splatter is still relatively strong. Rechecking, shows they are very strong at times. Noted at 21:22 talking about the recent granting of Tomos to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, Kyiv Patriachy. Identified their leader (Patriarch Filaret). Radio Svoboda ID. Belorussian language. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1413 MOLDOVA Grigoriopol 500 kW Vesti FM, Nov 7 2015 - Mostly RNE Radio 5 (with 3 transmitters of 25, 12 and 10 kW), but occasional Russian fading up to good level, but not very often. Spain is excellent. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1413 OMAN A'Seela 800 kW BBC WS, Nov 3 2021 - Very strong English programming, but faded down to be replaced with Vesti FM in Moldova with 500 kW in Russian. By 20:22, music dominated, which turns out to be RNE Radio 5 with 3 transmitters of 10, 12, and 25 kW. They also rapidly faded down. Thisis what makes MW fun. Stay on a frequency, and you'll go from station to station to station!. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1422 ALGERIA Ouled Fayet 50 kW Radio Culture, Nov 5 1928 - Good to very good reception with Arabic talk by OM. Soothing voices, akin to NPR programming in my mind! Some adjacent splatter. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1422 ALGERIA Ouled Fayet 50 kW Radio Coran, Nov 6 0107 - With several Arab stations here, wasn't sure who it was, but did finally find the correct link at the Radio Algeria website for Radio Coran, and confirmed (as was advised by my DXpedition attendees) by the audio feed found here: http://www.radioalgerie.dz/live/tab-chCoran.html <http://www.radioalgerie.dz/live/tab-chCoran.html> Up to good reception, on an otherwise lacklustre evening. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1431 DJIBOUTI Djibouti/Doraleh 600/300 kW Radio Sawa, Nov 9 2210 - Excellent reception with Arabic music. Faded down somewhat by 22:14. Amazing what a few kW will get you!. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1431 DJIBOUTI Doraleh 600 or 300 kW Radio Sawa, Nov 3 2010 - Very good reception with Arabic female vocal. Faded down revealing just a mish-mash. Only briefly before they came back at great level. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1449 IRAN Bandar-e-Torkaman 400 kW IRIB World Service, Nov 9 1814 - Listed in MWList as Turkish to 18:20, but NA at 18:15, followed by some strident talk, with mentions of Iran. Transmitter cut at: 18:16:00. Happy with this early catch. No one else on frequency at the time. Fair+ reception. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1458 GIBRALTAR Maida Vale 4 kW Radio Gibraltar Plus, Nov 5 2131 - In the clear with Tina Turner's Private Dancer, good reception with nice ID at the BOH, but shortly after, I did hear, 'Lyca Radio'. The UK station is 125 kW, but with auroral conditions, not an issue. Soon gone again, and strong signal from Gibraltar. Not bad for 4 kW! ID'd again at 21:38:20, 'on FM, AM, DAB and on-line', I think. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1458 UNITED KINGDOM Brookmans Park 125 KW Lyca Radio 1458, Nov 9 1826 - Good reception with South Asian music. // to web feed at: http://www.lycaradio.com <http://www.lycaradio.com>. Faded out replaced by someone else before the BOH. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1467 FRANCE Rououles 1000 kW Trans World Radio, Nov 5 2139 - Excellent reception in listed Kabyle. Not surprising, as they're super power and we are hearing that part of Europe/North Africa very well this afternoon. TWR IS and into Arabic at 21:45. Had to look up 'Kab', which I found out is part of an internationally recognized coding for languages, used in MWList, found here: https://www.loc.gov/standards/iso639-2/php/code_list.php <https://www.loc.gov/standards/iso639-2/php/code_list.php>. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1494 MOLDOVA Cahul (30kW) and Edinet (20 kW) Radio Moldova Actualitati, Nov 9 1950 - Good reception and // to audio feed at: http://radiolive.trm.md:8000/PGM1_128kb.m3u <http://radiolive.trm.md:8000/PGM1_128kb.m3u> Traditional Moldovan/Romanian music. Appears to be right on 1494.000, while there's a weaker cochannel measuring 5 Hz low. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1521 SLOVAKIA Rimavska Sobota 10 kW SRo 3 Radio Devin, Nov 4 0035 - Good reception in Slovak by YL // at same time to 1098 (a more jumbled frequency), 702 is also mentioned, but not heard. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1530 SAO TOME Pinheira 600 kW VOA, Nov 3 2031 - Good reception in English with an African music program (Ethiopian). Usually dominates the frequency over any domestic channel. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1548 MOLDOVA Grigoriopol 1000 kW TWR, Nov 7 2039 - Took me a while to figure out the language. Most strange! It's Hungarian, with many mentions of Bethlahem. Very good reception with minor cochannel presence. Mentions of Budapest at 20:59. Almost oriental sounding music. TWR IS at 20:59:50 x 1 and into Serbian programming. Ah, a language I can follow!. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1575 IRAN Jammer agains Radio Farda, Nov 3 2041 - Tremendous noise jammer well over Radio Farda, which is also well heard. Buzzing +++ Excellent signal strength. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1575 ITALY Genova 30 kW RAI Radio 1, Nov 5 1915 - Very good reception with only a hint of the Iranian jammer today. Discussion between an OM (in studio) and a YL (at the other end of a feed). (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1593 FRANCE Saint-Goueno 10/5 kW Bretagne 5, Nov 9 1900 - Good reception with weather forecasts in French. Mostly over another cochannel station with music. Suspect the latter is Romania. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1615 HOLLAND Zwolle, 1250 watts Mike Radio, Nov 8 2100 - An interesting afternoon here. A couple days ago, Mike Radio's op contacted me about a DX test to our PEI DXpedition. We agreed upon 21 to 22 UTC tonight. Unfortunately, conditions into north-central Holland were not ideal, so he QSY'd to 1618 upon our recommendation due to splatter from 1610 here. Occasionally faded up to fair+ levels, but often down in the mud. I did record the broadcast from the U Twente SDR, though, where conditions were generally good. Inverted L antenna mounted at 18.5 m elevation, and 22.5 m length. A fun part of our hobby. Many mentions directed at us with our names, location (PEI), and what we were doing here. Thanks, Mike!. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1624 EUROPIRATE Unid, Nov 5 0442 - Presumably Greek pirate with non-stop music at good level at times, including C&W music. The brief announcements are mostly undermodulated, but I suspect Greek, but not entirely sure. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1629 Europirate, Nov 6 2057 - Powerful signal, but of course faded down in time for TOH! Greek style sounding music. Many interruptions with chat, in presumed Greek. Very good at times! Wonder who they might be??? 1625 is the other rather strong Europirate, and sounding very much like the Dutch pirate Bluebird. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1698 SPAIN La Coruna EAR La Coruna Radio, Nov 8 2039 - Spanish Coast Guard radio with warnings including in English. 'Regional warning, number xxxxx, etc'. Concluded at 20:42:45. Espania Coast Guard heard at 20:40. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1710 USA Jersey City, New Jersey 10w WQFG689 and 1 other., Nov 5 0435 - Once the power was restored after a 24 hour outage, I became aware of 2 TIS stations, about equal in strength. The initial prominent one was a long loop from Hudson County, Office of Emergency Management. There are apparently 5 transmitters licensed, each 10 watts. The other cochannel was a slightly muffly sounding male speaker, with more highway information, which should be the Pennsylvania Turnpike TIS. An FCC search, though, didn't come up with any other TIS station besides the first one. The IRCA TIS list from 2018, does have others. K...760 is listed for the PA station. I was unable to find out anything else about this 2nd station. Listening carefully, though, I'm still hearing mentions of New Jersey and highway advisory, cochannel by the female voice, which I'm sure is the WQFG689 station . Perhaps one or more of the 5 stations listed under that ID is carrying another program? There is mention of www.???.org (I think). Listening again, it's www.511NJ.org <http://www.511NJ.org>. This frequency bothered me, so I listened again at 22:50 the next afternoon, and there they were again. With help of Bruce Conti who had laid a south directed wire, I could now work out who the 2 stations were: The New Jersey station, again (mostly dominant), with the slightly muffly male speaker, and the female speaker, occasionally fading up, being the National Parks Service TIS station at the Springfield Armory National Historic Site in Springfield, Mass. Glad to have that mystery solved!. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* *1730 EUROPIRATE unid, Nov 8 2327 - Pretty powerful at times with non-stop technomusic. Not sure who this is, or from where, but without doubt, a Europirate. Occasional splatter from a marine USB broadcast (from Norway) on 1728. (Salmaniw, P.E.I.)* _______________________________________________ IRCA mailing list [email protected] http://montreal.kotalampi.com/mailman/listinfo/irca Opinions expressed in messages on this mailing list are those of the original contributors and do not necessarily reflect the opinion of the IRCA, its editors, publishing staff, or officers For more information: http://www.ircaonline.org To Post a message: [email protected]
