CQ WW WPX loggings

The CQ WW WPX SSB contest occurs every year on the last weekend in March. This year was no exception and was over the weekend of the 24th/25th March (last weekend). I usually try and do some logging as unusual stations that you don’t normally hear pop up on all bands. True to form I managed to log some new countries. Although conditions were not ideal (they seldom are!) there were hundreds of stations on the air. Obviously the die-hard contesters are there with their 1.5KW stations, but there are smaller powered stations who make it through the noise.

So the following is a list of stations I managed to hear, and overall I was very pleased as It was just casual listening.

24/03/2018 – 80M –                                                                                                                                                                  EF8R 5,9 PG90T 5,9+10                                                                                                                                    40M –                                                                                                                                                                  SI9AM 5,8 EV1R 5,9 LY4L 5,6 S58Y 5,7 OL9R 5,9+10                                                                                  15M –                                                                                                                                                                  PY5JR 4,6 CN3A 5,7 PP5JN 5,6 CE2LR 4,6 ZY2Y 4,5

25/03/2018 – 20M –                                                                                                                                                                 9H6A 4,6 4X7R 5,6 JT5DX 5,7 A61QQ 4,5 FR4QT 5,6 LZ25TRC 5,9+10 PJ4V 5,8                                     VE3UDX 5,6 CT3KN 5,7 EF9R 5,9 4Z5LY 5,9 VB3E 4,4 EB7DX 5,9 YM7KA 5,7                                         ED9E 5,9+10 KQ2M 5,9 4L2M 5,9 NR7DX 4,4 PZ5RA 3,3 Z37M 5,9+10 IF9A 5,9                                     PJ5Z 5,8

The CW CQWW WPX is on in May, so if Morse is your thing that would be worth listening to. Its nice to get some unusual ones in the log!

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Snowy Shortwave Sunday

The snow forecast for Lincolnshire and other parts of the UK duly arrived on Saturday and continued into the small hours on Sunday (today). Total accumulation here was not big, about 4 inches (10 cm), but the wind made the temperature very low and most unpleasant to be out. The high winds had not done any damage to the antenna, so I settled back to do some SWLing. In between doing some other things, it was a very pleasant way to spend a Sunday, especially when the outside was so unpleasant. One station which I hadn’t listened to before was From The Isle of Music on 9400 KHz. This station transmits from Bulgaria and as I understand, features an eclectic range of music. Today it was Cuban Jazz fusion, and a very pleasant half hour was spent listening to this.

Another station not heard for a while was Furusato no Kaze from Palau, on 9975. Furusato no Kaze means ‘Wind of Home’ and is a special interest program for Japanese nationals abducted by North Korea.

As can be seen from the logs, most listening today was on the 25 Metre band. I find this band usually has something interesting to listen to, and even though the propagation predictions were not good, as can be seen, there was plenty going on! Its the reason that for me, Shortwave trumps any other form of information source. There is such a diverse range of stations and programs that it never gets boring. And there is always the thrill of the chase for that elusive station that you can just hear above the noise, but have trouble ID’ing.

And so, the logs.

5840 Khz Denmark World Music Radio 06:58 UTC Traditional Spanish sounding music.. ID at 07:00 followed by music from Bob Marley SINPO: 43323 2018-03-18

11775 Khz Taiwan SOH Xi Wang Zhi Sheng 09:38 UTC Chinese. YL and OM presenters. SINPO: 22112 2018-03-18

11970 Khz Taiwan SOH Xi Wang Zhi Sheng 09:46 UTC Chinese. YL and OM presenters. SINPO: 32222 2018-03-18

11555 Khz Northern Marianas Islands RFA 12:45 UTC Tibetan service. Sounds like an interview. YL presenter. SINPO: 33223 2018-03-18

11640 Khz Taiwan R Taiwan 13:53 UTC Chinese. Quite warbly at times SINPO: 33223 2018-03-18

11730 Khz Phillipines R Veritas Asia 14:20 UTC Bangla service. Music and discussions. ID 14:27 followed by jingle and schedules SINPO: 43333 2018-03-18

11740 Khz Singapore R Japan 14:32 UTC Burmese service. OM presenter SINPO: 44334 2018-03-18

11860 Khz Saudi Arabia R Sana 14:43 UTC Arabic. Discussion program SINPO: 33223 2018-03-18

9400 Khz Bulgaria From The Isle of Music 15:00 UTC Program featuring Cuban Jazz fusion music SINPO: 44334 2018-03-18

9335 Khz Phillipines VOA 16:09 UTC Burmese service. YL presenter. ID at 16:10 SINPO: 44334 2018-03-18

9975 Khz Palau Furusato no Kaze 16:22 UTC Japanese. YL presenter. Schedules and contact info prior to 16:30 sign-off SINPO: 43333 2018-03-18

Snowy weekend logs

Well, that’s not strictly true as we didn’t have snow all weekend. Sunday was thick mist, so not a day to be venturing very far. And the other days were just cold (in the British sense of the word for all the Canadians out there!).

From a propagation point of view, conditions seem to be settling down as we approach the spring Equinox, so there is a lot out there to be logged. Also, new stations are coming on the air which is always good news after a lot of the big broadcasters have deserted to the Internet. A couple that come to mind are World Music Radio, which has been transmitting for a few weeks now from Denmark. They seem to play predominately reggae-style music. Reception here in the UK is usually poor to fair, but they only use a 100 Watt transmitter at the moment.

The other is Shortwave Radio on 3975. They have performed test transmissions on 6160 since last year but have now the second frequency. Reception is usually very good from their 1 KW transmitter and they play an eclectic range of music from the 50’s, 60’s and 70’s. A very good listen.

And so to the logs. Not that many, but some good programs to listen to whilst I was doing other activities.

17885 Khz Botswana VOA 14:40 UTC English. VOA One The Hits SINPO: 44434 2018-03-03

17700 Khz Botswana VOA 15:04 UTC Hausa service. OM announcer SINPO: 43333 2018-03-03

13680 Khz Zambia Voice of Hope Africa 16:25 UTC English. Religious broadcast SINPO: 33323 2018-03-03

12125 Khz Armenia FEBA Radio 16:35 UTC Amharic. Discussion. SINPO: 43333 2018-03-03

11735 Khz Tanzania ZBC 17:35 UTC Swahili. Music and chat SINPO: 44444 2018-03-03

9650 Khz Guinea R Guinea 17:45 UTC French. Music and chat SINPO: 22222 2018-03-03

9390 Khz Thailand R Thailand 19:13 UTC English service. Global News SINPO: 44444 2018-03-03

17760 Khz South Africa Amateur Radio Today 08:14 UTC English. Broadcast from the South African Radio League. Discussion about propogation and the upcoming equinox. SINPO: 22222 2018-03-04

World Radio Day logs

Well, not much logged last night in terms of number of stations but the listening experience was good. First up was the following:

3975 Khz Germany Shortwave Radio 21:43 UTC English. Staffords World Rock Flashback program SINPO: 44434 2018-02-13.

Shortwave Radio is a small radio station in Germany who have been carrying out test transmissions for the last couple of months on both 6160 Khz and 3975 Khz. Their audience interest area is Western Europe and the UK. For the most part, when I have listened, it consists of an eclectic range of music from the 50’s to the present day. Last night the year of interest was specifically 1968. Usually a good signal into the UK in the evening, even though their power output is only 1 KW. They do respond quite quickly to reception reports, and will be issuing QSL cards in the near future.

Later on I caught WRMI on 7780, with VOA news followed by, again, another great range of music. I sent them a reception report via email, and this morning I received a response from them, with an E-QSL.

7780 Khz USA WRMI 22:30 UTC English. VOA News followed by a range of music until 23:00 SINPO: 44334 2018-02-13

All-in-all, a great listening session, which was all the better for being shared with friends on Facebook Group, Radio!Radio!

World Radio Day

Happy World Radio Day to all!

What will you being doing during this years WRD? I shall be sat at the radio sometime this evening listening what the world has to say via the ‘ether’. Whether it be enjoying some golden oldies fromn one of our more ‘local’ low power European stations, or the interesting magazine-style format of Radio Romania, or even, as last night, logging some utility stations from around the world, it’s all great radio. Talking of the latter, I was pleased to log Halifax Maritime Radio giving local coastal weather reports for the maritime community.

So whatever your listening pleasure, enjoy radio today and all the days of the year. It’s a great medium, and is largely, unaffected by politics and borders.

Long live Radio!!

BBC launches Ethiopian and Eritrean radio services

The BBC on Monday launched new daily radio services producing news, current affairs, features and English language training for Ethiopians and Eritreans. The BBC World Service programmes will be broadcast from Monday to Friday in the Amharic, Afaan Oromo and Tigrinya languages and will be aired on shortwave radio and streamed on Facebook. “There will be a strong focus on culture, health and original journalism from the region,” the British broadcaster said. It will also offer beginner, intermediate and advanced English language lessons once a week to speakers of the three regional languages.

The BBC last year launched an online portal entirely in Nigerian Pidgin, which takes inspiration from Portuguese, English, as well as Jamaican patois. It also launched a Korean service that is said could be available to listeners in North Korea if the signal is not blocked.

The announcements came as part of the World Service’s biggest expansion since the 1940s, funded by the British government. The expansion is designed to bring “independent journalism to millions more people around the world, including those in places where media freedom is under threat,” according to the BBC. “Through war, revolution and global change, people around the world have relied on the World Service for independent, trusted, impartial news”, said Francesca Unsworth, BBC World Service Director.

“As an independent broadcaster, we remain as relevant as ever in the twenty-first century, when in many places there is not more free expression, but less,” she added. The BBC World Service is the world’s largest international broadcaster, reaching a global audience of 269 million weekly, on radio, television and online.

BBC Director-General Tony Hall has set a target for the broadcaster to reach 500 million people worldwide by 2022.

Schedule :

1730-1830 UTC on 7595, 11720 and 12065 kHz

1830-1930 UTC on 9855 and 15490 kHz

1730 Amharic

1750 Oromo

1810 Tigrinya

1830 Amharic (repeat of 1730)

1850 Oromo (repeat of 1750)

1910 Tigrinya (repeat of 1810)

Heavy-handed action by Pakistan government

Pakistan’s Interior Ministry on January 19 ordered the closure of Radio Mashaal after Pakistan’s Inter-Service Intelligence (ISI) agency accused the private, U.S.-government-funded broadcaster of airing programs “against the interest of Pakistan” and “in line with [a] hostile intelligence agency’s agenda.”

Steven Butler, the Committee to Protect Journalism’s Asia program coordinator, commented: “The order to close Radio Mashaal is a draconian move by Pakistani authorities and a direct threat to press freedom,”

See the full story at the Radio Free Europe news site