DX LISTENING DIGEST 7-056, May 13, 2007 Incorporating REVIEW OF INTERNATIONAL BROADCASTING edited by Glenn Hauser, http://www.worldofradio.com Items from DXLD may be reproduced and re-reproduced only if full credit be maintained at all stages and we be provided exchange copies. DXLD may not be reposted in its entirety without permission. Materials taken from Arctic or originating from Olle Alm and not having a commercial copyright are exempt from all restrictions of noncommercial, noncopyrighted reusage except for full credits For restrixions and searchable 2007 contents archive see http://www.worldofradio.com/dxldmid.html NOTE: If you are a regular reader of DXLD, and a source of DX news but have not been sending it directly to us, please consider yourself obligated to do so. Thanks, Glenn NEXT AIRINGS OF WORLD OF RADIO 1358: ** tentative Mon 0300 WBCQ 9330-CLSB Mon 0415 WBCQ 7415 [time varies] Mon 0530 WRMI 9955** Mon 0930 WRMI 9955** Tue 1030 WRMI 9955** Wed 0730 WRMI 9955** WORLD OF RADIO, CONTINENT OF MEDIA, MUNDO RADIAL SCHEDULE: Latest edition of this schedule version, including AM, FM, satellite and webcasts with hotlinks to station sites and audio, is at: http://www.worldofradio.com/radioskd.html For updates see our Anomaly Alert page: http://www.worldofradio.com/anomaly.html WRN ON DEMAND: http://new.wrn.org/listeners/stations/station.php?StationID=24 WORLD OF RADIO PODCASTS VIA WRN NOW AVAILABLE: http://www.wrn.org/listeners/stations/podcast.php OUR ONDEMAND AUDIO [also CONTINENT OF MEDIA, MUNDO RADIAL] http://www.worldofradio.com/audiomid.html or http://wor.worldofradio.org ** AFGHANISTAN. To DXLD: I have more or less constantly been monitoring Radio Solh around 6700 kHz since they were reported in January on this QRG by Finnish DX-ers (Tnx). The station is heard almost daily from our late afternoon into the evening. When they first appeared they were on 6700.006 kHz but the last months they have been rock steady on 6699.998 kHz. Contrary to other observers I have never observed different programmes on the two sidebands. The station is using AM and not DSB. In Dari the call sounds like "Radio Solhe Afghan". Sometimes Radio Solh is heavily disturbed by unlicensed Greek pirates who are using 6700 kHz, LSB, for chatting in a very rude manner. Does anyone by 100% know the QTH of Radio Solh?? (Stig Adolfsson, Vallentuna, Sweden, via Thomas Nilsson, SWB, May 11, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** AFGHANISTAN [non]. R. Solh, finally audible again, just barely, via UK, 17705, May 11 at 1350 check with distinctive music (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) Solar-terrestrial indices for 10 May follow. Solar flux 71 and mid- latitude A-index 3. The mid-latitude K-index at 1200 UTC on 11 May was 1 (5 nT). The mid-latitude K-index at 1500 UTC on 11 May was 2 (13 nT). No space weather storms were observed for the past 24 hours. No space weather storms are expected for the next 24 hours (SEC via DXLD) R. Solh, 17700 via UK, May 13 at 1400 with ID on half-hour, music; fair (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** ALBANIA. R. Tirana was not making it past my neighbor`s TVI hash, May 11 at 1300 on 13750, but at 2015 on 13720, F-G signal and quite listenable, concluding at 2026-2028 with part of the Eurovision Song Contest entry, ``Hear My Plea`` yet again. When is that contest, anyway? R. Tirana, 13750, G on Sunday May 13 at 1325 with Albanian history to 1328* Overlapped a tone test from *1327 on 13745, presumably BBC via Armavir (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** ANGUILLA [and non]. Now`s the time to DX something else on Caribbean Beacon frequencies. 6090 was missing around 0540 UT May 11; and so was 11775 around 1247 and 1606 recheck. (But DGS was still to be heard via Costa Rica at 1249 on 11870v, with a het of about 200 Hz, so 11869.8? Did not determine whether high or low. No crackling!) 11775 looks open for SW Radio Africa today at 1700-1900; what else is there of possible interest? Nothing really on 11775, but if 6090 is still off overnight, there are low power stations in Brazil, Chile, Peru, Colombia(?), Liberia, and not so low power in Nigeria, not all of which may be active (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) See: BRAZIL; CHILE; NIGERIA; UNIDENTIFIED ** AUSTRALIA. SWBC QSL received: 5050, Yolgnu Radio/ARDS, Humpty Doo, NT, Australia date and frequency letter and info brochure for CD recording and goodies in 71 days from Dale Chesson, Radio Service Manager. He said in part, ``ARDS do not issue QSL cards but I write to confirm that you received Yolghu Radio`` etc. (Jim Pogue, Memphis, TN, 5/12, NRD-535, ICF-2010, Wellbrook LA5030 loop, attic longwire Quantum phaser, HCDX via DXLD) That would have been early March. There were several reports of this around that time from various sources in DXLD, but none from Jim (gh, DXLD) QSL letter from the Aboriginal Resources & Development Services Inc. 5050 kHz, Full data signed by Dale Chesson (radio Services manager). Sent an audio CD and post card from New Zealand. Mr Chesson informs that they don't issue QSL cards therefore he was confirming the details of my reception report by letter (Marcelo Toníolo, Auckland, New Zealand, JRC NRD 545 DSP + Longwire Antenna, Yaesu FRG-7, DXer since 1978, http://www.dxnz.co.nz May 12, dxing.info via DXLD) ** BOLIVIA. 4716.7, R. Yura, 0039-0049, May 10, Spanish. YL between musical selections. Several IDs. Fair. Consistently the best Bolivian logged at my QTH (Scott R. Barbour Jr., Intervale, NH, R8, R75, 200' Beverages, MLB-1, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** BRAZIL. Prezado Glenn Hauser, Seria possivel divugar o texto a seguir. Muito obrigado. Ulysses Galletti - PY2 UAJ Informamos aos radioescutas e dexistas do Brasil e do exterior, que o programa São Paulo de Todos os Tempos, da Radio Eldorado de São Paulo, transmitido em OM nos 700 kHz, fornecerá um cartão QSL Especial a quem enviar informe de recepção do programa que irá ao ar, sábado dia 26/05/2007 às 21,00 horas do Brasil, 0000 horas UT e domingo dia 27/05/2007 às 06,00 horas do Brasil, 0900 horas UT. O apresentador do programa Geraldo Nunes, que se identifica com os radioescutas, naquela oportunidade enviará uma mensagem especial para nós. Com o recebimento dos informes de recepção, poderá conhecer as condições de escuta em todo o estado de São Paulo, do Brasil e do exterior, mesmo com utilização de equipamentos auxiliares, os quais deverão ser informados. Será divulgada as escutas posteriormente e acredito muitos ouvintes irão se surpreender do que conseguimos. Os informes de recepção poderão ser enviados por e-mail para: spaulo @ radioeldorado.com.br mencionando no assunto INFORME DE RECEPÇÃO. O DX Clube do Brasil colaborará na confecção dos QSLs, contribuindo para que todos tenham a confirmação da escuta (Ulysses Albuquerque Galletti, py2uaj, May 11, DX LISTENING DIGEST) Special QSL offered for this program to greet DX listeners, but it`s only on MW 700, 50 kW. Also sent me a machine-English version of above, but it makes a lot more sense in Portuguese (gh, DXLD) ** BULGARIA. R. Bulgaria plays some wonderful folk music; such as UT Sat May 12 at 0520 on 11600. At first I had no idea what kind of music it was, but German announcement, and off abruptly at 0630* Only RB is scheduled on 11600 in German at 0500-0530, and on a 306 degree beam which is just as much for NAm as for Germany (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** BULGARIA. 9900, R. Varna, 0030-0102, May 7, Bulgarian/English. Romantic pop ballads between several IDs. R. Varna jingle at ToH followed by newscast. Fair with 9905-VOIRI splatter (Scott R. Barbour Jr., Intervale, NH, R8, R75, 200' Beverages, MLB-1, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) Once a week on UT Mondays, starting on UT Sundays ** CANADA [and non]. 7335 CHU / WHRI Protest against HRI and write to , , , , , 73 wb (Wolfgang Büschel, Germany, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) Hi all, It is true that here in Montreal, it is much easier to receive WWV than CHU, 3330 KHz once was a 24hr reception here but with elevated noise levels I can not receive it unless I go to a quiet location with a portable receiver. 7335 KHz does not come in much over here, it probably skips over Montreal since I am not that far from the transmitter site of CHU and 14670 KHz I've heard it maybe 2 or 3 times in 20 years of listening. WWV on the other hand comes in almost all day on 15 MHz here and 10 MHz evening is good and 5 MHz night is very good also (Gilles Letourneau, Montreal, Canada, ibid.) Let`s not get sidetracked by evaluating whether we get CHU or WWV better. We need BOTH for full coverage of the entire continent, with all the variables of propagation. And how would you like it if RCI decided to run a 250 kW transmitter on one of WWV`s frequencies? (Glenn Hauser, DX LISTENING DIGEST) I'm still waiting to get even an initial response from the FCC to a complaint I properly filed over 2 years ago in regards to the splatter from one of the religious stations (Dave Griffin, N2CHI = SAUGERTIES, NY, ODXA yg via DXLD) WHRI does have the history of taking over CHU`s 7335 frequency; your comments well founded. Wonder how they justify their actions? (Emmit Rodgers, San Francisco, CA, May 11, DX LISTENING DIGEST) RE: 7335 usurped by US station Hello Glenn, The issue of interference with WHRI has been raised with the FCC in the United States and with Industry Canada (our broadcast authority, part of the CRTC). We must go through all the politically correct channels to get this issue resolved. However our listeners can also use other appropriate means to raise this issue with WHRI. The support is mounting. I have had several email, of copies of letters, sent to WHRI, protesting their interference. If they get enough email from listeners of CHU, they may decide to vacate the frequency. Let us hope and pray they get the idea (Raymond Pelletier, Frequency and Time, Institute for National Measurement Standards, National Research Council Canada, Ottawa, May 11, DX LISTENING DIGEST) Has CHU really be coordinated at the HFCC? I have not seen any OTW (or whatever the site code may be) entries for 7335, 3330 and 14670 so far. Concerning the ITU: Their rules required to take all remaining utility services out of the 7300...7350 range, and relabelling CHU into a broadcasting service is quite obviously just a little trick to circumvent the ITU rules. An interesting side-aspect: This makes CHU also the first Canadian broadcasting station in the 90 metres tropical band as well as on a really far OOB frequency. What I mean to say with these remarks: It could backfire to refer to ITU and HFCC here. When I take a look at the FCC data I get an impression that not just World Harvest Radio is to blame for ruthlessly occupying 7335: 7335 0300 0600 WHRI 100 260 10 1234567 010407 281007 7335 0600 1100 WHRI 250 152 10-15 1234567 010407 281007 7335 1100 1400 WHRI 100 260 10 1234567 010407 281007 7335 2100 2200 WHRI 100 260 10 1234567 010407 281007 7335 2200 0300 WHRI 100 260 10 1234567 010407 281007 100 kW towards 260 degrees? This is obviously just wood, perhaps even thrown in there with the old Noblesville site in mind. Only the 250 kW towards 152 degrees are really meant to reflect an actual transmission, and one has really to wonder who actually got the idea to put it on 7335. I cannot help but suspect that the FCC is not willing to let the little "limited broadcast licence" trick through. How about a theory that they do this because the Canadians refuse to allow something the FCC requests? Like: You cause us trouble in implementing IBOC, so we block your trick to allow a utility station to continue on 7335? I have to add that I do not have the insight in North American broadcasting regulation to really judge if this is a possible scenario. But what I read in passing about IBOC leads me to such speculations. And the wooden 24 hours registration by the FCC is really remarkable, to say the least (Kai Ludwig, Germany, May 12, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) WHRI was supposedly moving one 100 kW transmitter from Noblesville to Furman, and the other to Greenbush, to supplement the existing 500 kW transmitters there. Seems to me that per schedules they have already used them to a limited extent, but this is not entirely clear. If they are ever on three frequencies at once from SC or two at once from Maine, this would have to be the case. CHU is now in the full HFCC A-07 schedules as OTT under 3330 and 7335, but not 14670. 10 kW, 24 hours, non-direxional, on behalf of RCI (Glenn, ibid.) At Greenbush it will perhaps be hardly possible to make much use of a second transmitter, since the antenna facility appears to be quite limited. I can't find a reproduction of the QSL from the WVHA days with the impressive night shot of the site right now, only this cropped one: http://www.hb9gce.ch/wcsn.JPG There appears to be only a single pair of curtain antennas, one for the high and one for the low bands (right and left in the picture), both aiming at 75 degrees and slewable to +/- 15 and +/- 30 deg, thus able to cover Europe and Africa. Apparently these antennas have not even another dipole curtain on the opposite side of the reflecting grid, so are not usable for the other direction (which in maximum slew position could be just barely justified as serving Canada). One should be aware of the circumstance that such high gain curtain antennas are really expensive items. Two more pictures of antenna details and a thumbnail of the control room with the Brown Boveri transmitter in the background: http://www.whri.com/index.cfm?fa=photosWHRA At Furman the antenna facilities are of course more comprehensive, but without details at hand it is hard to say which transmissions could be run with a third transmitter and which registrations are obvious wood due to lack of an antenna to bring them on air for real. So RCI now represents CHU at the HFCC, but are they willing to fight for their interests or do they just put the registrations into the database, as DW does with the domestic German transmitters, leaving transmitter engineers shrugging their shoulders and saying "we can't do anything about this" when one of the big boys blows away their humble transmitters (Ascension does so in the morning with 6005 literally forever, as an example)? And what is the recent frequency history of "Angel 1" (i.e. Furman towards South America) for the 0600-1100 history? Seems to me it was on 7315 until March 31 and had been moved to 7335 on April 1, right? If so, were there any known problems with 7315 that could have been forced them to move to another frequency, any real reason to make a frequency change? Of course my musings from last night are kind of a conspiracy theory, but the timing just makes me wonder. And with a 152 degree transmission from Furman the backlobe goes straight into the direction of Ottawa. That's better than the 6000 operation from Greenville, since CHU is meant to serve a domestic audience (Kai Ludwig, Germany, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) Well, if WHR is serious about using their old 100 kW transmitters at the new sites for overflow business at a cheaper rate, they could simply put up log-periodix or rhombix. Perhaps the shortwave sites Google Earth guys can look for signs of additional antennas. BTW, the official target areas of CHU on both frequencies are CIRAF 2,3,4,7,8,9, which means all of Canada, and all of the conterminous US except the western third, and that includes as far down as Florida. (Glenn, ibid.) 7335, CHU, Ottawa, mayo 6, 0610 UT, con SIO de 211, interferida por WHRI en inglés, sólo se logra escuchar el time pip, y es como si el locutor de WHRI tuviera hipo (Yimber Gaviria, Colombia, DX LISTENING DIGEST) hiccup ** CANADA [and non]. Paling only by comparison with the WHRI collision, is the Vatican Radio collision with CHU, which has been ongoing for many seasons now on 7335. Vatican via SMG currently A-07 scheduled 0010-0200 to Asia and 0230-0520 to Europe on 7335, all of them east- or northward, but often audible here, and worse, during prime time. As noted May 13 at 0503, poor, sounded like Italian but `Scandinavian` scheduled. At that time I don`t often hear Vatican under CHU as it`s getting pretty far into daylight, but Euro conditions were above normal {At least Vatican has not had the gall to aim broadcasts toward NAm on 7335} (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** CANADA. 4877.5, Radio Canada International, 0250-0259*, May 11, Thanks to Rich D'Angelo's tip. Weak sub-harmonic of 9755 with Spanish programming (Brian Alexander, PA, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** CHAD. The off-6165-frequency extremely distorted transmission of RNT has not been fixed yet; May 11 at 0526 I found it centered around 7305, instead of on the high side of 7310, but it was still heavily QRMing RN Flevo in Dutch on 7310. By 0557 when Flevo was transitioning to DW Sines, 7305 garbage had weakened considerably (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) Solar-terrestrial indices for 10 May follow. Solar flux 71 and mid- latitude A-index 3. The mid-latitude K-index at 0600 UTC on 11 May was 0 (4 nT). No space weather storms were observed for the past 24 hours. No space weather storms are expected for the next 24 hours (SEC via DXLD) Dear Wolfgang, I found on http://www.intervalsignals.net a sound sample of the s/on of RNT, while it was still on 6165 kHz. Have a listen; it is the same sign/on I heard distorted on 7313 kHz. See bijlagen/attachment. Have a good weekend! (Ehard Goddijn, R. Nederland, May 11, via Büschel, DXLD) with CCI, from RN? I keep checking for the extremely distorted RNT transmission. May 12 at 0510 it was right on 7310 with Flevo, instead of to one side or the other. May 13 at 0505 I could not make out any trace of RNT`s distorted signal around 7310 with Flevo and 7315 with stronger WHRI (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** CHILE. 1380 kHz, R. Corporación - Simply stunning at 0630 UT with an ID of all the entire network including R. Portales. All Frequencies given. Many mentions of "Radio Corporación". Nice clear signal. 13 May 07 (Geoff Wolfe, Bombala NSW, Australia, Kenwood R-5000, 300m BOG, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** CHINA. The Firedrake loop is exactly one hour. It used to restart on top of the hour, then this was changed to xx58 and checking today I heard the restart at xx04 on two consecutive hours. The loop seems to be composed of several extracts from a longer performance. A good guess is that they have selected the noisiest and loudest sections (Olle Alm, Sweden, May 12, DX LISTENING DIGEST) See INDIA [and non] ** COLOMBIA. Bogotá, 1460, HJJW. Caught a nice ID here at 0800 with "Nuevo Continente". Best ID I've heard yet. Hard to get a clear enough signal here in Australia. 11 May 2007 (Geoff Wolfe - Bombala NSW, Australia, Kenwood R-5000 - 300m BOG, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** CUBA. DFing CMDC-570 from Grifton, NC GRIFTON, NC 5/12/07. After taking the time to determine the source of the 1-Hz daytime carrier beat against WDNZ-570 (Raleigh) [and not WDOX as cited in earlier reports], and finding, to my GREAT surprise it is CMDC, Radio Reloj; Villa Clara, Cuba (30 kW), I've spent the past several days determining that it is indeed sea & groundwave. I conjectured that it was arriving via seawave and being defracted westward upon striking NC's Outer Banks. Today, I did a little DFing to determine where the CMDC signal apparently was coming from. This I did by carefully turning my SM-2 loop until I achieved complete extinction of the 1-Hz carrier beat against WDNZ. To put it briefly, I found the extinction point was almost identical to the azimuth of the null for WMFD-630 Wilmington, North Carolina. So that means that the RR-570 signal is traversing land from its landfall point in s.e. North Carolina, so that means there's no exotic sea/land defraction going on here. It's coming straight through. Express. I can't hear any other CMs here that I can recognize during the daytime, but CMDC is unique with its format. Another NC long distance daytime reception observation is grinding in my bowels. Nothing to surprise anyone. Later. Charles -33- (Charles A Taylor, WD4INP, Greenville, North Carolina, May 12, IRCA via DXLD) I thought maybe the ground conductivity would help it along, but according to http://www.fcc.gov/mb/audio/m3/ it`s pretty awful at 4 along the Carolina coasts. (30 = max in these parts.) 73, (Glenn Hauser, Enid, ibid.) And that's good. Most places rate a 2 on paper, and in actuality it's more like a .01 or so (Powell E. Way III, SC, ibid.) Of course it's seawave and groundwave. The questions are: What is the real power of CMDC-570, and, isn't anyone else (aside from in Florida) hearing this station on the US East Coast? Yes, I know the first 800 miles are seawave. I used to hear Cubans daytime from Bermuda, and most of the E coast of the US. The last 100 miles or so is over sandy loam. Very level (this area was once under the sea) with poor conductivity (Charles A Taylor, WD4INP Greenville, North Carolina, ibid.) Good job, Charlie! Great Daytime DX at (very) roughly 950 miles! I've never heard Reloj-570 during the day here but they frequently CLOBBER WMCA at night (Marc DeLorenzo, South Dennis, MA, ibid.) When it comes to Cuban AM's, little beyond what you hear and the frequency you hear it on is certain. Neither the Cuban government nor most stations recognize call signs. City of origin is usually an assumption based on past history, but with no guarantee facilities have not been moved. DF'ing can give some good clues, though, so there is some info in that regard. The FCC DB contains the latest information as submitted by the Cuban government to international authorities, but as is well known, Cuba doesn't play nice with others, so the data is very prone to errors. The WRTH lists transmitter powers mostly based on history, but the propensity of Fidel over the years to flip and flop facilities to purposes little related to serving the populous are all to common, and make history a poor reference. Huge signals popped up on 530 to counter recent Radio Marti activity, nearly wiping out reception of RVCI Turks & Caicos. The new jammer on 1550 is another example of stuff moving around. Those transmitters had to come from somewhere. Short of someone who has recently been at a given transmitter site, no one I am aware of would have specifics on Cuban AM's. Sorry, (W. Curt Deegan, Boca Raton, (southeast) Florida, USA, ibid.) Hearing call letters on any Cuban is quite rare, and should be treated as probably part of a feed from another station, so the call-frequency association s/b treated with great skepticism. It could be spoken in context of a colloquial nostalgic familiarity, I suppose, and not as any kind of formal ID (Bob Foxworth, Tampa, ibid.) ** CUBA. Emisoras cubanas por Yandys Cervantes Saludos amigo Jose Miguel, espero que se encuentre bien, por acá las cosas mas o menos, ahora mismo con mucho trabajo, me gustaría que me hiciera el favor de publicar en las listas, el siguiente listado de sitios cubanos. Un fuerte abrazo y gracias. LISTADO DE EMISORAS CUBANAS Y SUS SITIOS EN INTERNET 1. Radio Habana Cuba, RHC "Una voz de amistad que recorre el mundo" --- Prensa cubana en Internet en español, inglés, francés y portugués http://www.rhc.cu 2. Radio Rebelde Transmisión durante las 24 horas del día de una programación esencialmente informativa. http://www.radiorebelde.com.cu/ 3. Radio Reloj El canal de información continua más antiguo del mundo. La hora minuto a minuto. http://www.radioreloj.cu 4. Emisora Radio Progreso "La Onda de la Alegria" http://www.radioprogreso.cu/ 5. Radio Enciclopedia. Emisora Nacional La Emisora de la Cultura Cubana. Fundada en 1962, se distingue por su música instrumental variada, su exclusividad en el dial y por sus voces: todas femeninas. http://www.radioenciclopedia.cu/ 6. Radio Ciudad de La Habana La Emisora Joven de la Capital http://www.radiociudad.islagrande.cu/ 7. Radio Guamá, desde Pinar del Río, Cuba Emisora provincial del territorio más occidental de Cuba. Transmite en 990 KHZ en AM y en los 90,5 MHZ de FM en la capital provincial. Satisfacer las necesidades informativas, de orientación, educativas, culturales, divulgativas y de recreación de la población en Vueltabajo, está entre sus principales líneas de trabajo. http://www.rguama.cubasi.cu/ 8. Radio Ciudad del Mar Digital Radioemisora de la Ciudad de Cienfuegos http://www.rcm.cu/ 9. Habanaradio Emisora radial adscripta a la Oficina del Historiador de la Ciudad de La Habana. http://habanaradio.cu 10. Radio Bayamo Sitio Web de CMKX Radio Bayamo. http://www.radiobayamo.islagrande.cu 11. Radio Victoria, Las Tunas Página sobre Radio Victoria, http://www.tiempo21.islagrande.cu 12. Radio Angulo Digital [Angúlo] Sitio del sistema informativo de la radio en la provincia de Holguín. Trasmite desde el 1ro de agosto de 1936. Tiene su sitio WEB desde el 14 de marzo del 2001 http://www.radioangulo.cu/ 13. Radio Coco, El periódico del Aire La Emisora de Radio Informativa y Deportiva de Ciudad de La Habana http://www.radiococo.cu/ 14. Radio Metropolitana Emisora radial para la familia de la capital de Cuba. http://www.radiometropolitana.cu/ 15. CMBF. La esquina del jazz CMBF, Radio Musical Nacional, está caracterizada por la inclusión de obras musicales de autores clásicos, contemporáneos, del Tercer Mundo y en especial de Cuba, así como por la inserción de informaciones y comentarios de la actualidad cultural nacional y extranjera. http://www.cmbfjazz.cu 16. Puerto Padre.cu - Organo Oficial de Radio Libertad, Las Tunas Publicación digital de Radio Libertad. Puerto Padre, Las Tunas, Cuba Organo oficial de la prensa en el territorio http://www.radiolibertad.cu/ 17. Radio Morón Desde Morón, la Ciudad del Gallo, Ciego de Avila, Cuba. Surgida el 19 de noviembre de 1949 está considerada, al decir del pueblo de Morón, un verdadero símbolo del territorio. http://www.radiomoron.cu/ 18. Cadena Habana, la frecuencia popular Emisora de carácter provincial, es la Planta Matriz de la Red de Emisoras de la Provincia de La Habana. Ofrece una programación variada, con predominio de los informativos, musicales y de orientación. Las temáticas que trata reflejan el acontecer económico, político, cultural, educacional y científicos de La Habana que abarca a 19 municipios. http://www.cadenahabana.cu 19. Radio 26 Emisora Provincial, Matanzas Asiento de Playa Girón. Desde la Atenas de Cuba http://www.radio26.co.cu/ 20. CMHW, La Reina Radial del Centro de Cuba. Villa Clara Fundada el 15 de julio de 1933 http://www.cmhw.co.cu/ 21. Radio Sancti Spiritus Radio Sancti Spíritus es vehículo de todo el palpitar de la provincia espirituana, Cuba y el mundo y de la transmisión de los momentos más trascendentes de la vida económica, política y social del territorio. http://www.radiosanctispiritus.cu/ 22. Radio Surco Digital. Ciego de Avila RS Digital es el sitio Web de la emisora provincial Radio Surco en la provincia cubana de Ciego de Avila, la cual sale al aire por primera vez el 10 de octubre de 1952 con el nombre de Radio Cuba en la frecuencia de 580 kilociclos. http://www.radiosurco.cu/ 23. Portal de la Radio Cubana en Internet Uno de los principales objetivos del Sistema de Radio Cubana es que la programación transmitida por sus emisoras estén al servicio de los conocimientos, la cultura, la recreación y la defensa de la nación y de todos sus ciudadanos. Participa, al igual que el resto de los más importantes medios masivos de comunicación, en el desarrollo de Misiones Informativas en varias regiones del mundo donde los cubanos hacen historia. http://www.radiocubana.cu ___________________________________________ Ing. Yandys Cervantes Rodríguez WebMaster. Sede Universitaria Municipal. Buey Arriba. Granma. ycervantesr@sbueyarriba.udg.co.cu (via José Miguel Romero2, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** CUBA. CMBF -- Radio Musical Nacional -- is an oasis at the bottom of the dial here on the Georgia coast. During the winter, it fights Radio Disney out of Atlanta for 590 kHz. It has a great classical music playlist and is a regular on my crystal radio. 73, (Gil NN4CW Stacy, May 11, IRCA via DXLD) ** CUBA. 6000, Radio Rebelde, Bauta (¿?), 0650-0700, May 12, Spanish, local music, ann. and ID as: “Estas son las radionoticias por Radio Rebelde....”, in // with 5025, 24332. At 0715 the transmission wasn´t in parallel with 5025 (Arnaldo Slaen, Argentina, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) Normally 6000 carries RHC until 0700, and may or may not stay on later with relays of domestic networks (gh, DXLD) ** CUBA. 5025 KHz, Radio Rebelde, QSL-card, sticker, pocket calendar, postal in 395 days after f/up tnx to Arnaldo Coro who help me to obtain this (Nicolás Eramo, Argentina, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** CUBA [and non]. Re: ``Yes, VOA is currently scheduled on 6000 from Greenville. One can only wonder whether VOA doesn`t know about Habana, or deliberately is throwing away a frequency to annoy them (Glenn Hauser, ibid.)" May we assume a pattern here? "Inserted Pop-ups" when visiting the RHC website, co-channel "jamming" on RHC frequencies? What's next? (Bernd Trutenau, Lithuania, May 11, dxldyg via DXLD) Hmmm, how about a `phony` RHC that inserts pro-American propaganda into its news? (gh, DXLD) ** CZECHIA. Glenn, You wondered who would take the lead in using the Czechia label if Radio Prague will not do so. Frankly, I hope no one will start using the term. Czechia looks ugly, sounds ugly and is easily confused with Chechnya, which is why, I imagine, the English- speaking media around the world use 'Czech Republic' instead (Roger Tidy, UK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) Well, we can get rid of that wacky CZ, drop the confusing H too, and just chop Checoslovakia in two, much like axually happened, and call it CHECO (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) {If the combined county had happened to be called SLOVAKOCZECHIA it would be the Slovaks fishing around today for an acceptable name (gh, DXLD)} ** ECUADOR. HCJB CHANGES DRM TEST FREQUENCY TO EUROPE/NA HCJB in Ecuador has changed the frequency of its DRM tests beamed to Europe at 0400-0630 UT. Due to interference, 9870 kHz has been replaced by 9815. The same frequency, 9815 kHz, is now also being used for the DRM transmission to North America at 0100-0400 instead of 9915 (Source: HCJB via DRM Software Radio Forums) May 11th, 2007 - 9:13 UTC by Andy, Media Network blog via DXLD) I avoid using NA for North America, but instead NAm, since NA could also mean North Africa, if not North Asia, North Australia, North Antarctica. There are just too many continents starting with A. Please rename them, each starting with a different letter (gh, DXLD) ** EQUATORIAL GUINEA. 15190, R. Africa, 1044-1104, May 12, English. Religious program with YL reading listener mail to OM pastor for comment. Poor with constant "hum". Weak co-channel RHC IS at 1056 (Scott R. Barbour Jr., Intervale, NH, R8, R75, 200' Beverages, MLB-1, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) 15190 KHz, Radio Africa#2, Malabo, QSL-card, letter, schedule in 26 days report sent via web form (Nicolás Eramo, Argentina, DX LISTENING DIGEST) Which went to Cupertino CA? (gh) ** ERITREA. 7090 NF, VOBME, Asmara-Program 1, 0358-0425, May 11, Tune- in to IS, talk in local language at 0401. Horn of Africa music at 0422. New Frequency. ex-7100. Weak in noise (Brian Alexander, PA, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** ETHIOPIA. 9704.2, R. Ethiopia, 0347-0404, May 6, Vernacular. OM and YL between HoA musical bits. Presumed newscast at 0400. Weak but clear. // 7110-poor (Scott R. Barbour Jr., Intervale, NH, R8, R75, 200' Beverages, MLB-1, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** ETHIOPIA [non]. 11/5 [Friday] *1559 UT, 15260 kHz (S500), ANDANET LE DEMOCRACY - Samara (Russia), Programma politico in amárico, Flauto e parlato maschile. Segnale buono (SWL I1-0799GE, Luca Botto Fiora, Rapallo (Genova), Italy, playdx yg via DXLD) ** ETHIOPIA [non]. Re 7-055, the following should not have been filed under SOMALIA! Just because it`s in Somali language doesn`t mean it`s not for ETHIOPIA, where the Ogaden is (gh) ``SOMALIA [non]. Clandestina para Somalia`` 11640, Radio Xoriyo Ogadenia, 1650-1700, escuchada el 8 de mayo en somalí con emisión de música folklórica local, SINPO 45444. 15455, Mustaqbal Radio, 0603-0618, escuchada el 5 de mayo en somalí a locutor y locutora con comentarios, segmento musical, referencias a Ogadenia, SINPO 45444 (José Miguel Romero, Burjasot (Valencia), España, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** EUROPE. PIRATE (Scotland), 6400.02, Weekend Music Radio, 0000-0030, May 13, pop music, IDs. Fair but with t-storm static, (Brian Alexander, PA, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** GEORGIA. Radio Republic of Abkhazia (according to ID in Russian) or Apsua Radio (ID in Abkhazian) with special 10-minutes program on April 30th in Russian celebrating 75 Years from the first broadcast from Sukhumi of Abkhaz Radio. History, reading from the listeners letters from The Netherlands (Mr. Van Artem [Max van Arnhem?] approx said they), Russia etc. The most far letter is from Australia received there. Reported here 0800-0809 s/off on 9495 kHz. It is interesting that on MW 1350 kHz, Abkhaz Radio (at that time relays Radio Rossii program) is close down at around or just before the starting of TWR Central Asian Service on same frequency! MW 1350 in Caucasus officially is given as two transmitters: in Georgia and in Armenia (Rumen Pankov, Bulgaria, wwdxc BC-DX May 4 via DXLD) Another station was heard today on 9495 kHz at around 1600-1654 (s/on carrier of WYFR in Russian \\ 9505) - Russkoye Radio in Russian with Russian pop and disco songs, often ID. Russkoye Radio is known from summer FMDX on OIRT band where is heard on many frequencies. From 1510-1555 was another dance music Radio Relax (why not Radio Max as said Mr Trutenau?). All under jamming of DRM (Rumen Pankov, Bulgaria, wwdxc BC-DX May 8 via DXLD) ** GREECE. Katerina: Your "Hellenes Around the World" program in English at 1305-1400 UT Saturday was not audible in this area either on 15630 or 9420 kHz. However the repeat at 0200-0300 UT Sunday came in strong on both 7475 and 9420 kHz., 15650 is never audible in this area. I especially enjoyed the interview with the second man dealing with the movies. Regards (John Babbis, Silver Spring, MD, May 13, to ERA via DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** GREECE. 13170 usb, 06-05-07 1134, Olimpia Radio Fonia, 544. Durante la escucha de Olimpia Radio pude oir una conversación en griego entre un hombre y una mujer que acabó a las 1143 y empezó la identificación de la emisora en inglés y griego. A las 1145 un hombre hizo una llamada "Olimpia Radio" "S...... Whisky" y continuó la identificación de la emisora. Hasta este momento no había escuchado otra cosa por esta frecuencia que no fuera la identificación (Javier Robledillo Jaén, Elche (Alicante), España, EA5-1028, Rx: Sangean ATS909, Ant: Hilo 7 m, Noticias DX via DXLD) ** GREECE [and non]. Checking the May 12 edition of the Aoki, or Bi list at http://www.geocities.jp/binewsjp/bia07.txt I see a number of entries for Orimpia Radio, each 24 hours, 8 kW, on: 8424, 8734, 12603, 13134, 13170, 16830, 17326, 17359, 22387. Am not quite sure why, as these are maritime communications frequencies like many other stations which have nothing to do with broadcasting, tho there may be some weather ``broadcasts`` but doubtfully any VOG program relays, which were never done on maritime bands, anyway. Also has VMC and VMW frequencies from Australia listed, presumably due to their weather transmissions which some QSL-hungry SWBC DXers are going after, even tho they are obviously utility stations. Axually I was checking this list first to see if the LDS Radio entries on 17675 and 21520 were still there, as we discussed some weeks ago they apparently were for 3-year-old transmissions which may not have existed even then; and they were gone, probably removed some time ago (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** GUATEMALA. Re 7-054: ``TGSS-2 Guatemala (Trecevisión logo upper right). TGSS-2 is new. Their Website is not working, but the logo is on the Identifying TV DX from Latin America site (Danny Oglethorpe, Shreveport, LA, May 5, WTFDA via DXLD)`` Since Guatemala City has a channel 3, usually the most DXable TV from the country, where else in the country is TGSS-2? WRTVH is absolutely no help, with no channel info at all for its few Guatemala TV listings (gh, DXLD) ** HAWAII. Re 870/880 discussion: Doug Smith said... My guess is 690 and 760 get to keep 10 kW because they were already using it when the policy was adopted. But that's a guess... The amendment application specifically confirms Bill Hale's comment, that the power reduction is due to the Waipahu Monitoring Station and that the original 10kw permit already met all provisions of 73.37 and 73.182 with regard to interference to existing stations/applications. There is a typo somewhere, the limitation is 2,060 watts. (not 2,600) 73.31 provides for rounding of power levels, and this is where the 2,000-watt figure comes from. It is of course impossible to keep a transmitter precisely on authorized power. The FCC allows a tolerance of 90-105% of authorized power for radio stations. (it's 80-110% for TV) 2,060 watts is well within this tolerance for a station licensed for 2,000. Wednesday, May 09, 2007 10:11:00 AM (Doug Smith, American Bandscan blog via DXLD) ** HONDURAS. Cadena Radial Voces, former Radio Tegucigalpa, was detected Sunday 13, 0330z, on both 580, S=3 (seems to be the fundamental) and // new 1190, S=2, which this time showed up a little weaker, with their usual interactive promotions ranging from sports to news and opinion programs, and popular music. 73 (Raúl Saavedra, Costa Rica, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** INDIA [and non]. Glenn, Today I checked the AIR Chinese and Tibetan transmissions and accompanying jamming. AIR Chinese 11840, AIR sign on noted before 1145, than CNR-1 jamming until 1315, weak AIR signal noted in the background just before 1315. 15795, as 11840 except that this frequency was jammed by Firedrake 17705, CNR-1 jamming 1130-1330 and mostly very strong signal. Last winter AIR was occasionaly heard in the clear thanks to propagational quirks, but normally it's only CNR here. {see also UNIDENTIFIED} AIR Tibetan 9575, CNR-1 with weak signal heard 1215-1330, AIR not audible. CNR-1 also here to jam VOA Mandarin until 1200. 11775, AIR sign on noted before 1215. A first jammer with vibrating carrier frequency signed on well before 1215 with CNR-1, changing to Firedrake at 1215. A second jammer with stable carrier started with CNR-1 at 1215. CNR-1 stopped at 1330, the Firedrake some seconds later. AIR continued with its Nepali programme (unjammed). (Olle Alm, Sweden, May 12, DX LISTENING DIGEST) see also NIGERIA [non] ** IRAN. 17 MHz Log 1230-1300 UT; Not strong signals at present ... 17635, tentative IRIB Italian! program, wrong feed to Sirjan instead of Mandarin, S=5, 500 kW 60 degrees \\ scheduled IRIB 13735, 15190, 17535 carried all the right Chinese program feed (Wolfgang Büschel, May 11, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** KOREA NORTH. (DPR), 11710, Voice of Korea, 1020-1035, May 12. English programming with talk about Korean history. Local music. Fair to good. Very weak // 13650, 15180.02. 15180.03, Voice of Korea, *0100-0130, May 13, Sign on with IS followed by National Anthem. Opening English ID announcements, instrumental music, news. // 13760v - both frequencies weak (Brian Alexander, PA, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** KUWAIT. 15505, Radio Kuwait (tentative) (Kabd). 1928-1938 27 Apr 07. In Arabic. 2 OM announcers with talk including several mentions of "Maria" over music that sounded like "The Day Christ was Born." Radio Kuwait is the only station I found listed at the time and frequency, but it sounded like a Christian program, which wouldn't match a Middle Eastern station. Any ideas? Into ME music at 1933. Fair-Good (Joe Wood, TN, MARE Tipsheet via DXLD) See also USA [non] Well, HFCC also has Dhaka, Bangladesh until 2000 on 15505, but surely wooden and just as unlikely to be Christian. I suspect it really was Kuwait which isn`t exactly Islamic-militant, beholden to Christians for their very existence as an independent state. Kuwait is also on 15495 // much of the time, so check for that; one or the other is often well heard here, always in Arabic. FWIW, HFCC A-07 for those two Kuwait frequencies: 15495 0200 1305 38 KBD 500 286 1234567 250307 281007 D ARABIC 15495 1800 2400 37,46-48 KBD 500 286 1234567 250307 281007 D ARABIC 15505 0400 0740 29,30 KBD 500 345 1234567 250307 281007 D ARABIC 15505 1005 1740 37,46-48 KBD 500 230 1234567 250307 281007 D ARABIC 15505 1800 2130 6-8,27,28 KBD 500 319 1234567 250307 281007 D ARABIC (Glenn Hauser, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** LATVIA. LETONIA, 9290, Radio Mi Amigo, 1859-1917, escuchada el 9 de mayo en inglés a locutor con identificación, comentarios y programa musical con temas de rock sinfónico y rock duro, SINPO 45444 (José Miguel Romero, Burjasot (Valencia), España, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** LATVIA. THIS WEEKEND RELAYS VIA 9290 KHZ Sat May 12th Latvia Today 0800-0900 UT Radio City 0900-1100 UT Sun May 13th Latvia Today 1500-1600 UT Wed May 16th Radio MiAmigo 1900-2100 UT (Tom Taylor, May 11, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** LIBERIA [non]. See SIERRA LEONE [non] ** LIBYA. LIBIA?? 11835, Voice of África, 1815-1830, escuchada el 9 de mayo en suahili a locutor con comentarios, cuña de identificación, segmento musical, SINPO 45444 (José Miguel Romero, Burjasot (Valencia), España, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** LIBYA. (non?), 17725, Voice of Africa, 1400-1600*, May 11, Noted back on this frequency for English. (At least for today). ex-21695. English programming, IDs, news, commentary. Poor to fair. Poor on // 17870-must use ECSS-LSB to avoid DRM mess on high side (Brian Alexander, PA, DX LISTENING DIGEST) As already stated by Noel, 21695 made the switch to 17725 for the 1200-1600 period. Although the signal strength is highly variable, this signal and 17600 are often at fair level even when the ISS transmitters with LBJ and RFI programmes are barely traceable. The propagational behaviour clearly excludes any chance that 17600, 17725 and 17870 would be via ISS (Olle Alm, Sweden, May 12, DX LISTENING DIGEST) I agree entirely with Olle's findings. The signals on 17600 and 17725 are consistent at my location, and always audible, but those of Libyan Radio in Arabic are not. On May 9th (as already reported) "Libya" was co-channel with, and equal strength with, RFI on 17620, and a parallel transmission was also using 17625 at the same strength. But observations since then have resulted in very poor signals from RFI 17620 and no trace of any Arabic - until the 12th, when a unidentified transmission - similar strength to 17620 - was heard on 17645. I heard speech and music but could not catch an ID due to splash from strong WHRA 17650. However, it went off at 1400 which probably indicates what it was. The Afro-pop station has become 'mobile' again and this is usually very strongly received, and could have been 'masking' Libyan Arabic signals. So French involvement in this escapade still looks likely - and who/where is directing operations, not only of the jamming distractions but also of the movements made by Amal itself? (Noel R. Green (NW England) V. of Africa May 13 at 1401 on 17725 // 17870 in Swahili, 1403 drumming and late into English, poor (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** LIBYA [non]. [in frequency order:] 17622.5, Sowt Alamel Apr 25 1213-1225 35433-25432 Arabic, Talk, ID at 1213 and 1214. 17640, Sowt Alamel Apr 24 1202-1215 35433-25432 Arabic, Opening music, ID, Koran, Talk. 17642.5, Sowt Alamel May 08 1248-1255 34433 Arabic, Talk, ID at 1249 and 1253. 17645.5, Sowt Alamel May 08 1206-1216 34433 Arabic,Koran and talk, ID at 1207. 17667.5, Sowt Alamel May 07 1208-1221 35433 Arabic, Koran and talk, ID at 1211 and 1217 and 1219. 17667.5V, Sowt Alamel May 06 1219-1240 34433 Arabic, Talk, ID at 1237 and 1238, It moved to 17662.50 kHz to 1235. 17675V, Sowt Alamel Apr 27 1207-1236 25432-25421 Arabic, Koran and talk, ID at 1209 and 1216 and 1219 and 1232. It moved to 17667.50 kHz to 1220. 17675V, Sowt Alamel May 04 *1201-1215 35433 Arabic, 1201 sign on with ID, Opening music, ID, Koran, It moved to 17667.50 kHz to 1204 (All: Kouji Hashimoto, Japan, Japan Premium via DXLD) 17 MHz Log 1230-1300 UT; Not strong signals at present ... Noted Sawt Al-Amal - the Libyan opposition station via Grigoriopol on 17667.50 kHz, S=5-7. 17660 W African music station via Moyabi-GAB, lovely melodies, deeeep fades. S=7 (Wolfgang Büschel, May 11, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** MADAGASCAR. 5009.950, 5.5 1955, Radio Nasionaly Malagasy med non- stop highlifemusik fram till annonsering 2102 ”Musique populaire …. Radio Nationale Malagache”. Hade utsträckt programtid denna lördag. Cd 2104. Hördes inte på 3287. 2-3 SA --- 5009.950, 5.5 1955, Radio Nasionaly Malagasy with non-stop highlife music until announcement at 2102 "Musique populaire .. Radio Nationale Malagache". Extended schedule this Saturday with closedown at 2104. Not present on 3287. 2-3 SA (Stig Adolfsson, Sweden, SW Bulletin, translated by editor Thomas Nilsson for DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** MALAYSIA. Hi Glenn, John Wilkins has noted the recent absence of Klasik Nasional FM (RTM) from 5964.92, but was hearing Asyik FM (RTM) on 6049.65. On May 11, from 1238-1301, not only did I not hear Klasik Nasional FM, but also Asyik FM was missing, which for me was always the most consistently well heard RTM station. Traxx FM (RTM) (7295) seemed to also be silent. As usual I could not hear Wai FM (RTM) (7270), but then it is extremely rare for me to catch them through the QRM. Do not believe this is attributable to bad reception conditions, as I could easily hear the fairly regular Sichuan PBS-2 (China) on 6060. Hope this is only a temporary situation (Ron Howard, Monterey, CA, Etón E5, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) May 12, Asyik FM (RTM) back again. Heard from 1049 to 1125 with fair reception (would have been good except for the ever present het). Indigenous chanting/singing, 1102 into program of pop songs/ballads, 1120 Moslem sunset call to prayer (Kuala Lumpur sunset at 1117). Many singing "Asyik FM" jingles. Klasik Nasional FM & Traxx FM not heard (Ron Howard, ibid.) ** NETHERLANDS [non]. N6TST David Rosenthal now SK --- I just received my June QST and noticed that David Rosenthal is now a SK. I will always remember him from an ODXA DX camp quite a few years ago. It was interesting to meet him at the camp and then read about his life experiences on his web site. Not long after his article called Polar Bear Portable in QST last year, I sent him an email telling him that I had met him that time many years ago and that I liked the article. He replied back to me shortly after that. I am sure there are a few others who have met him and will remember him well as I do. Sorry news to pass on, (Al McRorie, VE3GAM, May 10, ODXA yg via DXLD) For the uninitiated, SK means silent key, i.e. a ham who has died and thus can no longer transmit, whether he ever used CW or not after passing his exam. SK, characters combined, is also used to end transmissions without the connotation of death (Glenn Hauser, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** NEW ZEALAND. After making sure that WOR 1358 was airing properly on WWCR 15825 (tho with rather too much distortion as usual, but much less on SW than their webcasts), UT Friday May 11 at 2030, I checked the RNZI live stream on WM at 2038 for Mailbox, which is scheduled this week, ``on now``, at 2035-2100. NO! Some other show about wildlife, visiting an island with seals and rats, so it`s not RNZI Talk either. The program grid still shows Fri 2035 as running Mailbox, but the page about Mailbox does not mention this repeat after the Monday airings. Would it be too much to ask for the posted schedules to mesh with each other and what is actually on the air? Interrupted ``Spectrum`` at 2049 for frequency change announcement! 2051 came back with weather for Niue, etc., music fill. And Bell Bird. Of what relevance are frequency changes on the webstream? And why don`t they arrange their programming so it is not interrupted by frequency changes, or vice versa? Nominal time for Spectrum, reviewed in 7-054, is 0009 UT Sundays (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** NIGERIA. Abuja 7275 vs TUNISIA: q.v. ** NIGERIA [non]. Radio Saa imminent? Please check Saturday at 1600- 1700 for Radio Saa, Hausa to Nigeria. We have conflicting reports about this. Is it still on 15180 as in TDP schedule (despite BBC Arabic), moved to 13770, or ??? Tnx, (Glenn Hauser, circa 1500 UT May 12, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) 12 May 2007 had a quick check for these frequencies at 1600-1605 UT. 15180 only BBC Arabic heard. 13770 nada (Jari Savolainen, (Finland), May 13, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) Clandestina para Nigeria, 13770, Radio Saa, 1620-1640, escuchada el 12 de mayo en hausa a locutora con boletín de noticias, referencias a Somalia, Afganistán y los Talibanes, Irán, Iraq y Bagdad, comentarios, SINPO 44544 (José Miguel Romero, Sacañet (Castellón), España, Sangean ATS 909, Antena hilo de siete metros, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) I also checked for this station on the 12th, and only the BBC in Arabic could be heard via 15180. I also tuned 13770 before and after 1600 (not as late as 1620 though) and I didn't hear any station at all - a clear channel. And so I assume that the broadcast came on late - or maybe retimed to do so? (Noel R. Green, (NW England), dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) Noel, I heard the same as you around 1600 but when checking 13770 at 1625 there was a station there; Björn Fransson in Hard Core DX May 2nd reported All India Radio after 1615 booming in, he said in Bangla or similar. The AIR website lists it as Hindi 1615-1730 to West Asia, was a decent signal but didn't get a positive identification as was going out, nothing else on channel (Mike Barraclough, ibid.) And I've just checked 13770 again today (May 13) and heard a station start with music in progress at 1613. After a pause there was clear ID as "Yeh All India Radio hei" and the programme language sounds Hindi to me. So could this be what José heard? (Noel R. Green (NW England), ibid.) Entonces, José Miguel, tiene certeza que lo que escuchara era Radio Saa en hausa y no AIR en hindú? (Glenn, ibid.) Saludos cordiales, acabo de regresar de Castellón de pasar el fin de semana; he leído los mensajes de respuesta sobre la escucha en 13770 que supuse se trataba de Radio Saa en Hausa. Una vez revisado el audio, todo parece indicar que no se trataba de Radio Saa, sino de una emisión de All India Radio en Hindú: Audio: http://jmromero782004.podomatic.com/entry/2007-05-13T09_50_06-07_00# 73 (José Miguel Romero, ibid.) José, your audio clip sounds to me like a language from Pakistan/ India/ Bangladesh region. I bet someone more familiar to these languages can tell us what it is. 73, (Jari Savolainen, Finland, ibid.) Jari, En efecto, según escucho la grabación, más me doy cuenta que se trata de algún idioma de aquella parte de Asia y no de África, aunque es dificil distinguir si es hindú o pakistaní, y muy facilmente uno puede equivocarse y confundirlo con el Hausa. En la grabación me ha parecido entender que decían "Baharati", lo que parece claro es que no es Radio Saa; la confundí. Atentamente (José Miguel Romero, ibid.) ** OKLAHOMA. Re 7-055, RDS on KOMA and other radio stations with playlist info: Confirm. Even the Public Radio stations are doing this. At least one, and maybe more, of KOSU 91.7, KCSC 90.1, and KGOU 106.3 do this now in the OKC listening area (Mike Andrews, W5EGO Norman, OK, Tired old sysadmin, May 11, DX LISTENING DIGEST) Can`t get KGOU here, and no RDS visible on KCSC, but --- (gh, DXLD) May 11 around 2000 UT, I did an FM bandscan on the DX-398 portable in the yard, only with whip, and found the following stations, mostly OKC, some Enid, with RDS. / is meant to separate fields, but not all may be in exactly the right place, as I scribbled hurriedly: 91.7: PUBLIC / RADIO / 91 7 / KOSU / OKLAHOMA / PUBLIC / RADIO / NPR- NEWS / 91 7 (I`ll have to check at some other time when they are playing classical music to see if playlist info appear then) 92.5: KOMA / 92.5 FM / [artist, song, 2-digit year] 94.7: OKC`s / NEW ROCK / 94.7 THE / BUZZ / [artist, song] 95.7: KXLS-FM 96.1: 96.1 / KXY / [artist, song] 96.9: RDS on but no readout 98.9: KISS / 98.9 FM 99.7: KNID-FM 100.5: 100.5 / THE KATT / HD / [artist, song] 101.9: TODAY`S / NEW COUNTRY / THE / TWISTER 102.7: ON / KJ 103 / HD / [artist, song] 103.1: KOFM 104.1: KMGL / 104.1 FM / [artist, song] 107.7: KRXO / 107.7 FM / [artist, song] A number of other strong signals were not running RDS, or maybe were not strong enough to bring it on (Glenn Hauser, Enid, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** PERU. Lima, 1320, OAX4I, Lima, WOW what a catch! Popped up nicely with a "Radio La Crónica" ID. Mixed in many other Spanish signals. 0757 UT 11 May 2007 (Geoff Wolfe - Bombala NSW, Australia, Kenwood R- 5000 - 300m BOG, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** PHILIPPINES. 9615, RVA, 1139-1200*, May 11, Mandarin/English. Language lesson at tune-in. YL with talks between classical music bits. YL with English ID and schedule at sign-off. Poor/fair (Scott R. Barbour Jr., Intervale, NH, R8, R75, 200' Beverages, MLB-1, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** SAINT HELENA. Re RSH test May 17 at 1500 on 11092.5: I emailed the station and received this confirmation ""Hello Mike, this is indeed true. Do hope that you will be able to join in on the day and relay back to RSH if we are transmitting. It is great to hear from you by the way. and once again thanks for the interest". The address for reception reports is radio.sthelena @ helanta.sh (Mike Terry, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) but, they say, no QSLs for this (gh) Maybe they are setting up to do some regular transmissions. I suspect the job of QSLing takes up too much time and they still have to look after local transmissions (Wayne Bastow, NSW, ARDXC via DXLD) ** SAUDI ARABIA. BSKSA or Radio Riyadh (both IDs are in use) in English usually till 1157 on 15250 but on April 21st was heard till 1255 and on May 1st till 1230 close down (Rumen Pankov, Bulgaria, wwdxc BC-DX May 4 via DXLD) The Broadcasting Service of Kingdom of Saudi Arabia or Radio Riyadh has only one emission in English per day from 0950 to 1155 hours on 15250 kHz (Rumen Pankov, R. Bulgaria DX May 11 via DXLD) ** SENEGAL [non]. U.K. Thanks for the recording of WADR I was able to hear them twice on 17870 not 17875 as the frequency is unless my rig is out. Once at 1510 UT this is odd, as their sked starts at 0700 till 0800 UT on 17875 kHz via Woofferton and at 0800 till 1100 UT via Skelton UK. Summer 2007 sked as per WADR web site. I sent them an e-mail a few days ago, wadr @ wadr.org West Africa Democracy Radio, Dakar, Senegal (Costa Constantinides, Cyprus, wwdxc BC-DX May 10, via DXLD) West Africa Democracy Radio 17875 0700-0800 46SW WOF 300kW 182deg USA NEW MER 17875 0800-1100 46SW SKN 300 195 USA NEW MER (Wolfgang Büschel, ibid.) REINO UNIDO, 17875, West African Democracy Radio, 1030-1055, escuchada el 12 de mayo en francés a locutor con entrevista a un miembro de la federación de voleibol del Senegal, comentarios sobre la sección femenina, cuña de ID y segmento musical con temas de Bob Marley, SINPO 45444 (José Miguel Romero, Sacañet (Castellón), España, Sangean ATS 909, Antena hilo de siete metros, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** SIERRA LEONE [non]. NO ID 9525, Star Radio?? 0723-0759, escuchada el 13 de mayo en inglés hasta las 0730 y en idioma vernácula africana hasta las 0759, locutor con comentarios y entrevista en una especie de misa religiosa con rezos de fondo, locutora con noticias, referencias a Tony Blair, África y Latinoamérica, SINPO 34433 (José Miguel Romero, Sacañet (Castellón), España, Sangean ATS 909, Antena hilo de siete metros, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) 9525, Cotton Tree News (CTN) via Ascension, 0734-0800* May 13, news in English & African languages, items about: HIV/AIDS (soundtrack of the Sierra Leone National AIDS Director); "This news comes to you from CTN, Freetown"; the United Nations Development Program Goodwill Ambassador (soundtrack of I assume Adisa Jelani Andwele, who was visiting Freetown this past week and held a workshop at the Fourah Bay College branch), drums, "This is CTN", drums, followed by the same news items in their "local languages", no sign-off announcement, mostly fair (Ron Howard, Monterey, CA, Etón E5, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) 9525, Cotton Tree News (CTN), e-mail from George Bennett, Editor in Chief, Cotton Tree News, Freetown, Sierra Leone ( gbennett76 @ yahoo.co.uk ): "Thank you very much for your email. I am impressed that you picked up our transmission in Monterey. We are in the early stages of our project and don't yet have a card [QSL]. Bernadette Cole has done a wonderful job with the Mass Communications Department here and we are very happy to be working alongside her, the faculty members and students". I believe Mrs. Cole is the Director of the Institute of Library Information and Communications Studies at Fourah Bay College, Mount Aureol, Freetown (Ron Howard, Monterey, CA, Etón E5, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) Saludos cordiales, una vez he visto el posting del amigo Ron Howard, me surge una duda: los dos escuchamos la misma frecuencia a casi la misma hora, Ron identifica a esta emisora cómo Cotton Tree News, según los diferentes listados, WRTH, Aoki y Eibi, anuncian para esta emisora de las 0730 a 0800 UT por 9525, sin embargo yo empecé a escuchar por esta frecuencia a las 0723 y ya había una emisión en inglés, la cual intuí que se trataba de Star Radio; sin embargo la emisión se prolongó mas allá de las 0730 y no aprecie en ningún momento un final de emisión y el comienzo de otra, en el siguiente audio creo que se puede apreciar tal circunstancia. Dura unos diez minutos y empieza a grabarse a las 0723 UT: Audio: http://jmromero782004.podomatic.com/entry/2007-05-13T14_08_23-07_00# La duda pues que me surge es si se trata en un principio de Star Radio o por si al contrario lo que escuché desde un principio es Cotton Tree News; siendo así, estaríamos pues con una emisora que comienza sus emisiones a las 0700 y no a las 0730 UT cómo se anuncia. 73 (José Miguel Romero, Spain, ibid.) Since Star Radio and CTN share the same facility it may well be that they are flexible on exactly when one ends and the other begins, and/or it may vary by day of the week. Since they both use English and vernaculars, it may also be hard to tell them apart (Glenn Hauser, OK, ibid.) Glenn, yo apostaría a que la transmisión fue de CTN; recuerdo que Star Radio tiene una cuña de ID muy característico y ayer yo no escuché su ID. JM (José Miguel Romero, ibid.) Hola José and Glenn, Interesting reception José! After hearing your audio, it's clear to me that you heard all the same news items that I heard via CTN, but am not sure of the language. CTN has English, Krio, Limba, Mende and Temne languages. George Bennett (Editor in Chief, Cotton Tree News [CTN], Freetown, Sierra Leone) explains that CTN is "a sister studio" to Star Radio and that CTN has taken over the second half of the existing Star Radio shortwave broadcast (0700-0800 UT). From the Star Radio website it seems that one reason that CTN has a news program here now is that Star Radio is experiencing financial difficulties ("We enter 2007 with a shortfall in funding and we need your support to ensure that we can continue to broadcast in Liberia this year"). Regarding my log of CTN from 0734-0800*, May 13: this was entirely a CTN news presentation. I say this because of several unmistakable IDs and also the news content (pertaining mainly to Sierra Leone). Star Radio's content in the past dealt mainly with Liberia news and issues, but has this changed? (Ron Howard, Monterey, CA, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** SUDAN. 4749.992, 9.5 1825, Trol Radio Peace med stilla program på EE och cd 1832. 1-2 SA --- 4749.992 9.5 1825 Probably Radio Peace with quiet programme in English and closedown at 1832. 1-2 SA (Stig Adolfsson, Sweden, SW Bulletin, translated by editor Thomas Nilsson for DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** SUDAN [non]. Sudan Radio on 11805 kHz at 0330 UT in Arabic/Somali. SIO 444. May 10th. Announcements by OM and YL nice IDs, news by YL, check out and tell me (Costa Constantinides, CYPRUS, wwdxc BC-DX May 10 via DXLD) Sudan Radio, outlets on Mon-Fri only. 11805 0330-0400 47E,48W DHA 250kW 240deg USA MNO MER 11805 0400-0500 47E,48W DHA 250kW 245 USA MNO MER (Wolfgang Büschel, ibid.) ** SUDAN [non]. Clandestina para Sudán, 17585, Darfur Salaam, 1704- 1710, escuchada el 12 de mayo en árabe a locutora con noticias, ID “…BBC London”, en paralelo por 15515, SINPO 45554 (José Miguel Romero, Sacañet (Castellón), España, Sangean ATS 909, Antena hilo de siete metros, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** TUNISIA [and non]. Contrary to WRTH Update sked, RTT does cut 7275 off at 0530, as checked May 11: a few sex after that minute, went to open carrier, and off around 0530:21, while same program continued on 7190, which has a better signal here anyway; also contrary to HFCC which shows both at 0400-0800, 265 degrees on 7190, 340 degrees on 7275. BTW, FRCN Abuja, Nigeria, is supposed to open at 0430 on 7275, but I seldom hear any trace of it before or after 0530; may operate only sporadically. Per WRTH; not in HFCC (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** UKRAINE. Hello Friends, Have noticed, just by chance two new transmissions of Radio Ukraine International (I assume they are relatively new). Heard them on 9945 at 0730 and on 7490 at 1910. I checked the schedule on the website of the National Radio of Ukraine, and the English Schedule is as follows: 0000-0100 7440 0300-0400 7440 0500-0600 9945 0700-0800 9945 1100-1200 15675 1400-1500 Via Sat Only [and webcast?] 1900-2000 7490 2100-2200 7510 Best Wishes and 73 (Christopher Lewis, UK, May 13, DX LISTENING DIGEST) The new broadcasts were in DXLD some weeks ago (gh, DXLD) Re: ``7530 kHz to Eu, 55 degrees from Kharkiv. So is RUI in English at 14 on 7530, or not?`` No, Glenn, English was there for few days only. Now solely by satellite & Internet. ``not much English-speaking Europe in that direxion!`` That's the reason why it was cancelled. -- 73! (Serghey Nikishin, Moscow, Russia, DX LISTENING DIGEST) Well, it was supposed to run for a few days only from the outset. Not clear why they did it at all (Glenn Hauser, DXLD) ** U S A. REVIEW & OUTLOOK --- Boos for Al-Hurra --- May 11, 2007; Page A10 We've been watching the debate over Al-Hurra, the U.S.-funded Middle East TV channel that has lately developed a reputation as a friendly forum for terrorists and Islamic radicals. A bipartisan group of Congressmen has called for Al-Hurra's news director, former CNN producer Larry Register, to resign -- and it's time he and his supervisors gave taxpayers some answers. . . This article will be available to non-subscribers of the Online Journal for up to seven days after it is e-mailed. http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB117884907316599493-lMyQjAxMDE3NzE4MTgxNDE5Wj.html (via David Cole, OK, and Mike Cooper, GA, May 11, DXLD) ** U S A [non]. KUWAIT, 7555, VOA relay, 0018-0030*, May 12, English. VOA Special English with "Focus on Business". Strong co-channel carrier comes on at 0029. If I heard correctly "To learn more visit dynet.com" was mentioned at 0030. URL takes you to an Austin, TX based company. Poor/fair. Per Eibi listing, VOA in Pashto via Sri Lanka takes over at 0030 with good signal (Scott R. Barbour Jr., Intervale, NH, R8, R75, 200' Beverages, MLB-1, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** U S A. Anyone home at KAIJ? Hello World of Radio & Mr. Hauser, A little confused as to what is going on at KAIJ? I have listened for extended periods of time to find programs abruptly cut off in mid sentence as much as 10 minutes prior to the program end, if you are going by UTC time. This is usually followed by the same station announcement repeated several times then the station will go silent for as much as two to five minutes. This is not an occasional incident but seems to be consistent on KAIJ. The Power Hour program gets cut off abruptly rather frequently. An announcement for Reverend Peters repeats multiple times then station goes silent. The program then picks up in progress at the beginning of the next hour. World Of Radio has been the same outdated program repeatedly several weeks in a row and then it will get cut about 10 minutes short as well. I have never heard the end of the outdated program. Programs get cut then an announcement will run over and over followed by 5 to 10 minutes of silence. I listened for three weeks for the conclusion of in interview with Wayne Green only to find the same program three weeks in a row. I never did hear the end of the wrong segment as it was cut off I would estimate about 10 minutes short. The station then ran a recorded announcement that repeated several times then went to silence. It seems to be a let down after hearing KAIJ identify with the Dallas theme and announcer that would lend to a substantial radio operation. Indecently [sic!] today they are running the same Wayne Green interview again; could this be correct? There is no decline in shortwave listeners as some would alledge, there is a decline in shortwave stations that offer up worth while things to listen to. The Wayne Green interview very interesting yet a fine example of my frustration each week the same program gets cut off. I now listen to The Power Hour on XM and still on WWCR. It is frustrating listening to World of Radio and having the program go off abruptly and never hearing the end. I do enjoy World of Radio and have been listening for a number of years. I was happy to find you on KAIJ as the signal is very good. It is a waste of time attempting to listen to your presentation on KAIJ. Keep up the good work. It's back to WWCR and my IPOD (Emmit Rodgers, San Francisco, CA, May 11, DX LISTENING DIGEST) KAIJ must be relying too much on the unworthy automation (Glenn Hauser, DXLD) ** U S A. WHRI, collision with CHU: see CANADA [and non] ** U S A [non]. Die US-amerikanische protestantische Radiomission Family Radio erhoehte im Mai 2007 massiv die Belegung der T-Systems- Station im Wertachtal. Zu den bestehenden 25 Senderstunden kamen am 1. Mai 21 Std. und am 15. Mai noch einmal 6 Stunden taeglich hinzu. Im Ergebnis strahlen zwischen 13.00 und 23.00 Uhr drei bis neun Sender 52 Senderstunden lang Programme von Family Radio aus. In der Spitzenzeit um 16.00 Uhr sind neun Sender in Wertachtal fuer Family Radio in Betrieb. Aus Juelich werden 4 Stunden ausgestrahlt. Family Radio hatte vom 12. bis 25. Februar 2001 Testsendungen ueber die Telekom-Sender in Juelich und sendete erstmals ab 25. Maerz 2001 regulaer aus Juelich. Mittlerweile kommen die meisten Sendungen aus dem Wertachtal. Weitere Recherche, insbesondere was die Sendesprachen anbelangt, ist angebracht (Dr. Hansjoerg Biener, Germany, wwdxc BC-DX May 8 via DXLD) ** U S A. Thanks for the information on WHRB & Lyric Opera on WFMT. Fewer shortwave stations are providing any interesting programming to listen to. Other than DX I spend a good deal of time listening to streaming audio and my IPOD (Emmit Rodgers, San Francisco, CA, May 11, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** U S A. FM Mystery solved --- Posted at 7:05PM on Friday, May 4, 2007 in dx and fm and tv. Last weekend a couple of us in the Washington metro area were hearing Spanish language programming on FM 87.7. I sometimes get skip from some distant channel 6's here and even on the car radio, but it appears this one is a new local station. According to dcrtv.com: 4/30 - DCRTV hears that the DC area has a new TV station. It's a low- powered operation on channel 6, W06CJ. It's IDing as "UTN6 Washington DC" and owned by a group called Signal Above DC. It's said to be relaying programming from the Spanish language Unison Network, with shows from Ecuador and Argentina. The station is licensed to Fairfax, has its transmitter in North Arlington, and beams its signal toward DC..... (Radio Free Mount Airy via DXLD) Surely it`s 87.75 +/- 10 kHz, ch 6 TV station masquerading as radio, like a few others such as in NYC (Glenn Hauser, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** U S A. TEXAS' TALLEST STRUCTURE BRINGS EMERGENCY COMMUNICATION, SPANISH RADIO --- By Andy Hogue, GAINESVILLE DAILY REGISTER (GAINESVILLE, Texas) Published: May 10, 2007 05:42 pm ROSSTON, Texas — Unknown to many locals, a structure taller than the Empire State Building or the Sears Tower was quietly built in the southwest corner of the county. The largest structure in Texas — known technically as Liberman Broadcasting Tower Era — was erected in 2006, east of Rosston. The tower, which appears from miles away as just another vertical row of flashing white strobe lights common to the county, is a guyed mast - a structured tower supported by guy wires attached to the ground. The tower reaches 2,000 feet - 609.6 meters - into the north Texas sky. The tower is located on the MK Ranch between Era, Leo and Rosston and stands prominently visible along FM 922. It shares the distinction of being one of 24 towers in the United States at the maximum height allowed by the Federal Aviation Administration, which regulates antenna height. . . http://www.jacksonvilleprogress.com/statenews/cnhinsall_story_130230739.html (Daily Progress, Jacksonville TX, via Artie Bigley, DXLD) Built for KNOR 93.7, but surely other broadcasters will use it. Tower also has ham radio repeaters on it, etc. (gh, DXLD) ** U S A. Legal scope of TIS content? I know that according to 47CFR90.242(a)7, TIS stations "... shall transmit only noncommercial voice information pertaining to traffic and road conditions, traffic hazard and travel advisories, directions, availability of lodging, rest stops and service stations, and descriptions of local points of interest." Can some TIS stations get permission to broadcast other kinds of info? I ask, because there is a TIS station here in Los Alamos WQFJ525 1610 kHz, licensed to the county that is not catering to travellers, but to the local residents. The station announces that it is an "emergency advisory radio station" purchased through a grant from the Department of Homeland Security. It is licensed through the FCC as a TIS station, though. In the event of an emergency, we are to tune in for public safety instructions, information, advisories, announcements, etc. In the meantime, the station is broadcasting plugs for local county services, such as the county's website, the county library's locations and hours, the county customer service center, the local crimestoppers tip line, and even information about how to apply for county employment. Also, there is information about how to avoid getting the flu, and what to do if you do get it. There is currently an extended announcement about the possibility of prescribed burns in the area forests, including locations and methods. I'm sure that very little of this information is apropos to travellers. I'm betting that the county's use of the station oversteps the conditions of its license. The Los Alamos system seems to be synched. When you drive between the two locations, it's seemless. There is no SAH beating, and there is no delay in the audio from one transmitter to the other. The system covers the county well with these two 10 watt transmitters. Our local graveyarder wishes they had as complete coverage as the TIS.... -- (Mesa Mike Westfall, N6KUY, WDX6O, Los Alamos, New Mexico (DM65uv), May 11-12, IRCA via DXLD) Nope, actually what theyre doing is completely legal. I've heard many stations doing it before, including WPII600, 1570Khz in Glastonbury, CT. TIS licenses are to broadcast what is "in the public interest" and if that is, such as flu information, county contact numbers and such; it's legal (Paul B Walker Jr, NRC-AM via DXLD) I don't see that in the federal regulations regading TIS stations, though. Admittedly, I may have missed it. But I do see the clause specifying what TIS stations may transmit. It doesn't mention "whatever is the public interest." It's a lot more specific than that. Just wondering what I've missed (Mesa Mike Westfall, N6KUY, WDX6O Los Alamos, New Mexico (DM65uv) NRC-AM via DXLD) There is quite a lot of information about the Los Alamos system (2 transmitters) at http://www.issinfosite.com/articles-case-study-los-alamos.htm including an e-mail link to the person responsible for the operation of this system. The company that provided the equipment for the Puyallup system says they have 3 transmitters all on 1580. The Information Station Specialists (ISS) web site is a wealth of great information on TIS/HAR systems. It includes a partial list of National Parks that use ISS supplied systems including the call signs which are normally difficult to find. And it has a great state by state list of the many TIS stations that it has provided equipment for across the US. The web site is at http://www.issinfosite.com The ISS web site mentions the following systems which they confirm to be synchronized: Boca Raton FL - 2 stations on 1620 Miami FL - 3 stations on 1680 Pinellas County FL - 5 stations on 940 Naperville IL - 3 stations on 1610 Battle Creek MI - 3 stations on 1610 City of Brunswick OH - 2 stations on 1700 Putnam County TN - 4 stations on 1610 DOE - Pasco WA - 4 stations on 530 They list a number of other systems with multiple transmitters on the same frequency but don't confirm whether they are synchronized. There are several possible sources of grants for this type of equipment including FEMA, LEAF, and the FIRE Act. The ISS web site http://www.issinfosite.com also has quite a bit of info on obtaining grants for TIS/HAR systems including several success stories (Patrick Griffith, Westminster CO, IRCA via DXLD) Two things are a definite no-no: broadcasting music (though a few have a musical bridge between items), and advertising for a commercial entity. When there isn't a lot going on, some stations more or less become Community Information Stations. Along the East Carolina Coast, there are a few that babble on about little, using a National Weather Service re-broadcast to fill up air time (Mike Hardester, NC, ibid.) I have not seen anything official about this, but variations on emergency advisory stations seems to be the current fad. After 9/11 these stations have been popping up all over. Locally, Howard Country and Arlington County both have emergency stations on 1700. As Russ has noted, there are several in New Jersey too. Since they have been popping up since 9/11 it would not surprise me if there were not a DHS connection (Bill Harms, Elkridge, Maryland, ibid.) My local TIS/MIS has a pair of transmitters on opposite sides of town. Their synchronization is anything but exemplary. Being somewhat away from them both, I hear them both. The audio sounds like it is under water, with the gurgling sound to it. I measured the two carriers just now and found them off by 30 Hz, just as they were months ago when I wrote the city administration and pointed this out. At that time the second system was new and in the process of being fine tuned, now it is just neglected. This city radio station is operated by the department that manages and programs the city cable TV channel. Yet another channel I've never watched --- don't even know which one it is. One more hole down which the city pi$$e$ away the taxpayers' money. And they wonder why there is a property tax revolt underway statewide. Need I mention that the "Emergency Advisory Radio Service" radio station was off the air for four day following hurricane Wilma, the direct hit on Boca a couple years ago. But what the hey, I was without power for eight days, so I shouldn't have even noticed. God save us from the politicians (W. Curt Deegan, Boca Raton, (southeast) Florida, USA, IRCA via DXLD) I remember a TIS station in WI when I was on vacation a few years ago. It had about a 15 or 20 minute minute loop with a male and a female announcer imitating a typical morning radio show. Except that the entire programming was banter about a local public attraction. It seems like it may have been a water theme park. I recall that I almost drove out of the coverage area before hearing the entire loop so I pulled over to listen. It may have been related to the WI Dells. (Patrick Griffith, Westminster CO, Broadcast Technician NRC Broadcasting - Denver, IRCA via DXLD) Mesa Mike should hear the one in George, Washington on 1610 (which gets out rather well) (and no, I am not making that up; there is a place called George, WA). They carry well-produced little mini- programs which I think are from Washington State. I heard the same sort of thing on a couple of outlets around Bend, Oregon last summer. I think these were also ecologically oriented and were produced by Oregon State. I did hear an infraction once, though, on the 1610 HAR off of I-5 in Tacoma. In between traffic problem info items, they would run promos for events at the Tacoma Dome. I think that lasted about a month (it was three years ago). (Pete Taylor, Tacoma, NRC AM via DXLD) This is an anecdotal item about the WSDOT (Washington State Department of Transportation) which runs our HARs. For many years, they had the same person voicing all the IDs. About a year and a half ago, a lady's voice was substituted. I know I am losing highs but she had a dreadful voice and in some cases, I simply could not pull out all the call letters even if I was next to the transmitter. During this period they also discontinued specifying transmitter locations. About six months ago, the original "announcer" came back and with him, the station locations. Meanwhile, there is a TIS/HAR on 1580 in Puyallup (Puyallup abuts Tacoma. It is pronounced "pyou-AL-up). It is run by the city and has good coverage. Its primary purpose is to be there in the case of a lahar. (A lahar is what happens if a volcano erupts - all the flowing lava, etc.) Recently the station started giving two sets of call letters. I couldn't tell any difference driving around Tacoma. However, I drove to an area east of Puyallup a couple of weeks ago and could discern two signals in an area on the way back. They were beautifully synced; there was no discernable beat. You could only sense it when one would drop out due to terrain. A newspaper article indicated that the new one was in a place called Orting. Additional ones are planned, apparently. Other than LAX, does anyone else know of other synced TIS/HARs? (Pete Taylor, Tacoma, WA, 12225w 4719n, ICF2010 + Kiwa air core loop, DX398; Palomar loop, ibid.) ** U S A. AM STATION CAUSES FIRE ON CATALINA ISLAND I read on another list, and saw on the news, that a tower crew replacing guy wires at KBRT was apparently responsible for this fire. The power poles feeding the site are reported to have burned away as did the telephone lines providing audio to the station. The transmitter is reportedly running on backup generator. They were anticipating returning to the air today (Saturday) with audio provided via CDs while a satellite link is being established. From what I've read in the past I think KBRT still has a resident engineer living at this site. They appear to have low power night authority. I would be tempted to wonder if they might operate on high power for a few nights providing local info. On the other hand, if they are relying on generator power for an unknown period, they will probably want to conserve fuel (Patrick Griffith, Westminster CO, Broadcast Technician, NRC Broadcasting - Denver, IRCA via DXLD) KABC TV has reported that the fire on Catalina Island, California -- may have started near a radio transmitter site. KBRT - AM 740 -- a 10 kW daytime station has been silent -- for two days. However -- an open carrier has been heard -- during the daytime -- from 735 to 740 kHz -- in Southern California (Mike McKenna, May 12, IRCA mailing list via DXLD) I just checked out the Crawford Broadcasting Company web site. They have a section called The Local Oscillator which is a monthly newsletter for their engineering department. How ironic that this month's blog from KBRT CE Bill Agresta (written before the recent fire) begins "Greetings from very dry Santa Catalina Island!" In it he details how extremely dry (and bug infested) it has become there. He also mentions the tower crew that has been replacing the guy wires. It appears that he had been having a number of problems with them prior to the fire. He also mentioned the fact that the extreme conditions have caused him to consider joining the local volunteer fire department. What a prophetic blog given the events of the past few days! (Patrick Griffith, Westminster CO, ibid.) Was it KBRT itself or a contractor that did the work? If the contractor, which I would guess. They would be responsible I would think. But I doubt they would have enough insurance to cover the damage (Patrick Martin, OR, ibid.) It sounds like the tower crew was responsible for the fire, so the company they work for will have to ante up for the damages (Bruce Portzer, WA, IRCA via DXLD) ** U S A. 1520 kHz, KGDD Oregon City OR - So strong it was clearly heard in wide band AM! Gave 2QN 1521 a run for its money! Impressive IDs of "GDD Radio". 0711 UT 13 May 07. This station had mystified me for about a month now. Took a while to work out who this station was. Previous IDs weren't quite clear enough (Geoff Wolfe, Bombala NSW, Australia, Kenwood R-5000, 300m BOG, DX LISTENING DIGEST) {Correxion: it`s a Mexican, XEJCC; see 7-057} ** U S A. So much for the History Channel. A series on the States, 5 at a time, hit Arizona UT May 13; how much can you cover in 10 minutes or so? Could you at least get right what you do cover? Narration about Meteor Crater was illustrated with views of some other, obviously volcanic crater; astronauts were training at MC, but they were shown stumbling thru lava fields, which have nothing to do with MC! I also watched the 3-hour show on the Spanish-American War, cringing every few minutes as the narrator butchered Spanish pronunciation. I spotted his name in a split second on the closing credits, but forgot to write it down. Then I looked at the History Channel website and could not find anything at all about that show, even in the War category listing lots of other programs (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** VATICAN [non]. Vatican Radio broadcasting from Monaco 1900-2200 UT on 702 kHz / 400 kW 08/05-2007 VATICAN --- I hear here in Holland Vatican Radio on 702 kHz to-day. Until 1930 UT in Italian and right now 1945 in French. Modulation is in parallel with internet channel 1. Look at: http://www.radiovaticana.org/coorpro/entrasmisspec.htm 1950 UT 702 kHz silent or deep fade?? At 1956 classical music on 702 kHz! 73's from Almere, Holland Ehard Goddijn (8/5-2007) Here at my place (50 km north of the Danish/German border and Flensburg) I only hear NDR Info via the transmitter in Flensburg with some music underneath. Vatican Radio not listed on this frequency in the EWMG, neither in the WRTH 2007. NEW frequency? Ydun Ritz (8/5- 2007) VATICAN / MONACO --- It is now 2110 UT 8/5/2007 and Vatican Radio is still on 702 kHz most likely via MCO-transmitter. I heard French, English, Spanish, Arab and right now again Italian with SIO=2/3-4/3-3. No trace of the German transmitter you hearing, only some kind of a Luxemburg-effect probably with high power MCO-longwave transmitter 216 kHz. 73's, Ehard Goddijn (8/5-2007) 09/05-2007 VATICAN / MONACO --- Vatican Radio signing on with IS at 1858 UTC on 702 kHz to-night May 9th 2007. At 1900 UT program in Italian. SIO= 233/2 fading and someone co-channel. 73's, Ehard Goddijn (9/5-2007) Source: http://mediumwave.info/news.html Best regards & many 73s! (via Dragan Lekic from Subotica, Serbia, dxldyg via DXLD) VATICAN RADIO TESTS ON 702 KHZ WERE FOR TWO DAYS ONLY Mediumwave listeners in Europe have been puzzled by the appearance of Vatican Radio on 702 kHz for a couple of days. Although not mentioned on the website of Vatican Radio, we found an explanation on http://www.italradio.org A report dated 5 May says “Vatican Radio will test Medium Wave 702 kHz from Monte Carlo on May 8 and 9 at 1900-2200 UT relaying the European Programme in Italian (1900 and 2200 UT) French, English (1950 UT) Spanish, Arabic. Transmitter will use 400 kW power and directive aerials (65 ). Reception reports are welcome.” In an update on 12 May, the site notes that “Listeners from various Italian locations reported to Italradio good reception in Central Italy but problems both in the South and especially in Northern Italy where interferences from 693 kHz RAI DRM transmitter in Milan were rather strong.” (Source: www.italradio.org)(May 13th, 2007 - 10:36 UTC by Andy, Media Network blog via DXLD) Jonathan Marks Says: May 13th, 2007 at 12:37 e Interesting that one of the issues for the Pope on his visit to Brazil has been how to counteract the effects of the evangelical church. Monte Carlo was a main transmitter site for Trans World Radio until 2004. I think they stopped because of rising costs (Monte Carlo is not a cheap place to run an office or rent airtime it seems). Now the Vatican steps in. I think DW also did test transmissions from here into North Africa a few years ago (Media Network blog comment, ibid.) VATICAN collision with CHU on 7335: see CANADA [and non] ** VENEZUELA. 1420 kHz, R. Marabina. Weak with slow crooner type songs and ID. Mixed with another Latin with talkback program. Nearby 3XY running just open/carrier for two days running making the 1420 frequency clear! 0649 UT 13 May 07 (Geoff Wolfe, Bombala NSW, Australia, Kenwood R-5000, 300m BOG, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** VENEZUELA. SINDICATO BOLIVARIANO DE RCTV SÍ EXISTE Con gran sorpresa he leído en días recientes (DXLD 7-051) la "réplica" de uno de los colegas de la lista, con respecto a una nota facilitada por mí, a través de la página informativa, Aporrea, la cual relataba la persecución laboral padecida por los trabajadores de RCTV que simpatizan con el proceso revolucionario o que forman parte del naciente sindicato bolivariano de dicha empresa. En un estéril ejercicio pseudoargumentativo, el compañero de la lista de DXLD intenta ponerme ante el espejo público como un irresponsable y mentiroso. En primer lugar, estimado colega, no hay ninguna campaña en contra del señor Marcel Granier, directivo de RCTV, ya que él SOLITO se ha encargado de descalificarse. Participó en una conspiración para dar un Golpe de Estado y aplicó un "apagón informativo" en su empresa, RCTV, durante los días 11, 12 y 13 de abril de 2002, entre otros elementos. El señor Marcel Granier podría ser calificado como un "delicuente comunicacional", con todas las de la ley, ya que en el año 2002, él y su canal, violaron todo el entramado jurídico vigente, incluyendo el relacionado con el artículo 171 de la Ley de Telecomunicaciones (2000), en su apartado SEXTO. Le recomiendo al colega leerse la legislación comunicacional correspondiente, porque --- a todas luces - -- parece DESCONOCERLA. En segundo lugar, según el compañero diexista, el único sindicato que EXISTE Y EXISTIRÁ en RCTV es el Sinatraincoractel. Es decir, ¿los trabajadores de RCTV que no se sientan representados por los lineamientos del ya nombrado sindicato "oficial", no pueden agruparse en tienda aparte para reclamar sus legítimos derechos laborales? Por favor. ¿Dónde tiene la cabeza el colega? ¿Tendrá idea de la insólita aberración sintagmática que ha escrito? No quisiera imaginarme al colega de marras como patrón de una empresa. ¡Pobres trabajadores! ¿Qué opinaría la comunidad internacional si se enterara --- al contrario de lo que se "vende" --- de que los directivos de RCTV sí APLICAN LISTAS NEGRAS y PERSIGUEN A LOS TRABAJADORES DE LA PLANTA sólo por ser CHAVISTAS? ¿Qué pensarían si supieran que el discursito edulcorado de la libertad de expresión es pura "mentirita", puros "efectos especiales"? Debe ser éso lo que mortifica al compañero diexista. La verdad. En tercer lugar, he repetido cientos de veces en mis artículos que el asunto de RCTV NO ES UN CIERRE. Sencillamente, EXPIRA, CADUCA, VENCE una CONCESIÓN. Por lo visto, el colega no recuerda --- O NO SABE --- el significado del término CONCESIÓN. Pues vamos a refrescarle la memoria. Según el DRAE [Diccionario de la Real Academia Española?], CONCESIÓN es: “Acción y efecto de conceder/ Negocio jurídico por el cual la Administración cede a una persona facultades de uso privativo de una pertenencia del dominio público o la gestión de un servicio público en plazo determinado bajo ciertas condiciones”. En pocas palabras, la concesión tiene un período determinado y al acabarse el tiempo acordado entre las partes, el Estado está en su potestad de RENOVARLA o NO RENOVARLA. Es como cuando usted alquila una casa o un carro; cuando trascurre el lapso convenido de uso u ocupación del bien dado en concesión, usted debe devolverlo al propietario o arrendatario. Si no lo hace, usted es UN DELINCUENTE y ESTÁ AL MARGEN DE LA LEY. ¿O no? En el contexto del tema bajo análisis, RCTV pierde el derecho a explotar el espectro radioeléctrico del canal 2, de la banda VHF, en la ciudad de Caracas. Ocurriría lo mismo con la totalidad de sus estaciones repetidoras a escala nacional. Sin embargo, RCTV podría continuar sus emisiones por los sistemas de televisión por cable o consagrarse exclusivamente a la producción de contenidos para la exportación a otras latitudes. El fulano "cierre" es una vil mentira repetida mil veces. Por tal razón es muy preocupante el comunicado de la FIP (Federación Internacional de Periodistas), adjuntado por el compañero diexista, debido a que el anterior "detallito" de la concesión no lo mencionan en el texto. El citado escrito está plagado de un DESCONOCIMIENTO delirante y vergonzoso acerca del caso RCTV y de la realidad política venezolana, en general. Sería interesante preguntar: ¿dónde estaba la FIP cuando a los venezolanos se nos cercenó el derecho constitucional a estar informados, durante los días 11, 12 y 13 de abril de 2002? Excelente que ellos respondieran a esa interrogante. La cruel realidad, para el colega y el resto de defensores a ultranza de RCTV, es que el Sindicato Bolivariano de RCTV es una REALIDAD y no la pueden ocultar. Es pertinente acotar que un derecho a réplica se solicita para desmentir datos erróneos o imprecisiones, acerca de una persona o hecho consumado. El colega dio rienda suelta a una apasionada e inconsistente argumentación para "salvar" a RCTV y - lamentablemente- no aportó nada serio al debate. (ADÁN GONZÁLEZ, Certificado de Locución #26950, Catia La Mar, Estado Vargas, VENEZUELA, DX LISTENING DIGEST) I feel obliged to present both sides of this issue, since two of our Venezuelan correspondents wish to debate it, but would really like to call a halt to this now, as we shall see what happens at Mayend, regardless of their arguments. Que será, será. It will be interesting to find out if RCTV, once off the airwaves, continues to exist on cable and as a program producer, as Adán suggests, or if the Chavistas will find a way to ban that too. This is all about retribution, no matter how it is couched. For Adán, the Chavistas can do no wrong and he will find any way to justify their actions. I wish their opposing views could be accessible on a larger scale in Venezuela rather than so remotely here (Glenn Hauser, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** VENEZUELA [non]. RNV via Cuba was already fired up and QRMing underneath WYFR 17750, Sunday May 13 at 1403 with warmup ``Mundo Siete`` show from RHC (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** WESTERN SAHARA [non]. ALGERIA/W. SAHARA, 6300, RASD, 2335-0001*, May 9, Spanish/Arabic. Spanish talks at tune-in followed by Arabic music until 0000. OM sign-off announcement and presumed NA. Fair (Scott R. Barbour Jr., Intervale, NH, R8, R75, 200' Beverages, MLB-1, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** ZAMBIA. 4915, CVC, 0054-0102, May 12, English. Contemporary religous music with usual CVC IDs and promos. Poor, gave up at 0102 due to relentless CODAR (Scott R. Barbour Jr., Intervale, NH, R8, R75, 200' Beverages, MLB-1, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) Scott, Is 4915 correct? CVC should be on 4965, while ZNBC may use 4910 or 5915 (Glenn, ibid.) ** ZIMBABWE [non]. I tuned SW Radio Africa soon after 1730 on the 10th of May via 12035. The signal at my location about 360kM north of Rampisham was peaking 9+20dB. Normally, signals from this station struggle to get anywhere near the 9 mark on my S meter, so either there was a lot of back radiation from their antenna and short skip, or it isn't RMP. It stayed at this strength throughout the transmission, by which time MEY 4880 was becoming audible - didn't hear the jamming. The two Russian outlets on 11775 and 11810 were less strong, and CRI German wiped out 11775 entirely after 1800 (Noel R. Green (NW England), dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) Tonight the SWRA frequencies were brought up only with some trouble. 11775 switched at 1658 from local test tones to what appeared to be the VTC feed, carrying unID programming in presumed Arabic (probably something else than just BBC WS). After a few seconds this had been replaced by pairs of one low-pitched and one higher pitched test tones, presumably originating from either the Bush House control room or SWRA itself, since I already heard these tone sequences on SWRA frequencies before. 11810 switched at 1659 from local test tones to a VOR feed, probably in Arabic, until they finally corrected it and brought SWRA up at 1701. No signs of any co-channel signals, so probably the Arabic heard by Glenn was the result of both audio sources being mixed up. 12035 is very weak here. Carrier, apparently with no modulation, first traced at 1658. Later I could make out during a peak that it indeed run // 11775 and 11810. Impossible to tell anything more, since it got almost buried in the sidebands of the huge VOR signals on 12030 and 12040, but it could well be the case that 12035 originates from a site outside England now (Ascension or whatever). (Kai Ludwig, Germany, May 11, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) SW Radio Africa (between 1700 and 1900 UT on May 11, lousy condition): 11775 - Moscow tx S=8, and 11810 - Armavir tx S=9, latter feed 1/8th second behind Moscow. 12035 - Rampisham 500 kW usual poor Rampisham signal strength at my location in Germany, S=3 only today. Adjacent powerful VoRUS signals on both 12030 and 12040 kHz with S=9+40dB ! (wb, May 11) SW Radio Africa (via RMP- left this site as of May 1) 12035, 1700-1900 daily, in favour of another European site. 11810 & 11775 are from Russian outlets but "new" 12035 probably is not. No jamming of all the three 25m frequencies, all heard in Zimbabwe although 4880 is jammed. (David Pringle-Wood, Zimbabwe, May 11, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) None audible here May 11 around 1800, even with absence of Anguilla 11775 (gh, DXLD) 12035, SW Radio Africa, 1720-1859*, May 12, "Callback" interview program. Local music. IDs. "Health Beat" program. Good signal. // 11810-weak. // 11775-threshold signal with Anguilla still off the air (Brian Alexander, PA, DX LISTENING DIGEST) UNIDENTIFIED. Checking 6090 with Defunct Gene Scott, Anguilla still missing, May 12 at 0533 I was getting at least two weak signals producing a fast SAH of maybe 20 Hz; one of them preaching in Portuguese, Portuñol or Spanish past 0600, gaining on the others. Brian Alexander had better luck, measuring R. Bandeirantes on 6089.95 after 0600, and a couple hours after that, R. Temuco, Chile was on 6089.87. Earlier until 2300 he put Kaduna, Nigeria on 6089.85 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) UNIDENTIFIED. 9153.0, spy letters replacing numbers, in groups of 5 in Morse on A3, 1000 Hz tones easily determined by stepping up and down 1 kHz on YB-400, at 1305 May 11 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) UNIDENTIFIED. INDIA//CHINA?? 17705 NO ID, hoy 11 de Mayo a las 1159 se aprecia una emisión con música Hindú, probablemente el servicio en chino de All India Radio. La señal es pobre y con mucho ruido; a las 1200 comienza otra emisión en chino o mandarín, locutor y locutora con comentarios, probablemente algún servicio de Radio Internacional de China o algún canal del servicio doméstico de China. En el siguiente audio se puede escuchar a una locutora con lo que probablemente sean los titulares de algún boletín de noticias, acompañado de un segmento musical muy característico: Audio: http://jmromero782004.podomatic.com/# (José Miguel Romero, Burjasot (Valencia), España, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) {see also INDIA} ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ UNSOLICITED TESTIMONIALS ++++++++++++++++++++++++ Thanks again for all your great work and the valuable info you provide in DXLD. It's the best, most diverse resource for our hobby that I know of. 73s, (Jim Pogue, TN, MVM) LANGUAGE LESSONS ++++++++++++++++ IGNORING CHINESE TONES Returning to the topic of Taiwanese place name pronunciation & for the benefit of the MW DXers, the location known as Taitung (south/eastern Taiwan) is pronounced as Tai-Jung. Don't confuse with another Taiwanese city called Taichung. :-) Regards. (Ian Baxter, AUSTRALIA, shortwavesites yg via DXLD) Hi Ian, But the tones are probably different. One really can`t convey Chinese pronunciation without indicating them using devices such as rising/falling/high/falling+rising accents etc. or numbers, depending on the system employed. I wonder why doing this seems to be out of fashion among Sinophiles now? Just too much trouble? 73, (Glenn Hauser, ibid.) Hi Glenn & all, Whilst writing the previous email I did think about attempting to indicate the tone. Mandarin Chinese as you correctly indicated has those 4 distinct tones (Hakka 5) (Cantonese 7) from memory - well Mandarin has 5 tones if you include no tone. I must admit to sometimes having trouble picking tones, I have to listen very carefully & frequently need the word repeated to correctly pick the tone. High Tone = 1 Rising Tone = 2 Falling/Rising Tone = 3 Falling Tone = 4 Using the above as a guide I suspect TaiTung would sound like:- Tai2Jung or Tai2Jung1 or maybe Tai2Jung4, but doubt it - would need to hear the word again. I think part of the problem as you correctly alluded to is "too much trouble" (on the keyboard) & fear of getting it wrong. I'm no expert at only 200 odd words of Mandarin & no formal training. Situation gets even more complicated as "sometimes" the tones of words can change depending upon whether the preceding word/character ended with a rising or falling tone also. One can discover more about Mandarin tones on the Internet/Wikipedia OR if you want to challenge yourself try this site: http://www.shufawest.us/language/tonedrill.html I only scored 80% so if you don't know any Mandarin & you do better than me give yourself a pat on the back :-) Anyway if you`re a DXer who wants to tonify your language skills this site might help. Yes pun intended :-) Enjoy! (Ian Baxter, ibid.) TXer site lurkers & spies, Now my skivvies (=undershorts) are in a REAL knot! You said Taitung would be pronounced "tai jung," but I doubt that very much. I believe that it would be "tai dong." Seems to me that's what I heard back in my three-year sojourn on Okinawa. During that period, 1-kW MW stations on eastern littoral of Taiwan were easily audible from Okinawa all day long. Damn straight. I have to go to my ASCII table and "copy and paste." A real rectalgia. Vietnamese expresses its tones with diacritical symbols, although VV can be expressed using Kanji. During my one-year tour in Vietnam, I saw Kanji used on shops & stores owned by ethnic Chinese. Enough! Otherwise, I'll ramble on for four or five paragraphs! Perfesser Chuck (Charles & Leonor Taylor, Greenville, North Carolina, ibid.) ?? Kanji is Japanese (gh, DXLD) Taichung (Tai-Zhong) is pronounced with a "retroflexive" ch sound. That is, the tongue is directed back to make contact with the roof of the mouth, rather than the ridge behind the teeth. To the ear of someone who isn't familiar with the sound, it's just a "ch" sound. However, to a Chinese who is brought up hearing the sound, it is clearly distinctive from the regular "ch" sound. Chinese is the only language I know of that has a sound for "r" that is nearly the same as for American (shudder) English. In fact, In think the word "are' would mean "and" in Mandarin. Brits and Ozzies drop their final "r's." That leaves cracks on the sidewalks/pavement behind them. Class dismissed! Pehfessah Charles ----- (Charles & Leonor Taylor, Greenville, North Carolina, ibid.) Okay Charles, You've got my vote :-) Initially I think I should have written TaijOng, but after hearing a Chinese speaking Frenchman on RTI's 'People' program last night (Internet) it does sound more like TaiDong - oops sorry people...... Well we're all better informed now (I'll just find myself some dark hovel somewhere to hide in now) :-P You know at times I've failed to correctly repeat a word of a native Chinese speaker when I've been poorly instructed by them on how the word sounds, although it appeared to me that I had correctly sounded the word; it's not until I had either seen the word in print, written in a easy sounding form with accents, or where the mechanics of tongue placement & sounding were described - that I've got it right. Such is the frustration of learning Chinese (or many other languages for that note I guess). Thanks for the benefit of your knowledge & experience Charles - appreciate it very much. How much do you charge per hour of language lessons? You'd make an excellent language teacher :-) Thanks :-) (Ian Baxter, ibid.) DIGITAL BROADCASTING ++++++++++++++++++++ DRM: see ECUADOR; GEORGIA; LIBYA; VATICAN WHAT CONSTITUTES MATERIAL DEGRADATION TO A DTV SIGNAL? (DXLD 7-055) I really appreciate the links to the FCC docs on this subject. Some thoughts.... -- While broadcast stations obviously have a lot invested (financially and otherwise) in the DTV transition, their primary concern should be that all potential viewers can access their programming (and see their commercials, promos, and count in their ratings) in ANY format. Despite all the talk of their concern over downconverting ("degrading") their digital and HDTV signals, it should be obvious to them that any "solution" that potentially reduces their audience is not wise. -- No one should have to invest money in a new TV set or digital box just to continue viewing the same broadcast signals they already receive. Of course, while cable operators understandably would love to see ALL their subscribers switch to their higher-priced digital services (on my local system, it seems like every other commercial is plugging the wonders of digital cable), they need to understand that forcing them to do so would not only engender resentment and anger, but may well LOSE them subscribers, primarily poorer families who simply cannot afford a significant investment in new equipment and higher monthly fees. (I know MY household certainly falls into that category!) -- Ideally, the cable transition to all-digital should be achieved over a period of time through simple attrition and depreciation. All analog sets will eventually go south, especially the cheaper imports which have a rather poor record of reliability. As subscribers` analog sets die their natural deaths, then those individuals will be able to transition to a digital-capable set at that time, but they should not be forced to do so beforehand. The problems with this are: (1) Digital TVs need to come down -- way down -- in price for a lot of folks to afford them. (2) Even with the rapidly approaching analog shutdown, analog-only sets are STILL sold in stores -- hell, my local Wal-Mart has huge displays of 13" analog sets for 49 bucks -- and there is no sign that they plan to stop stocking them anytime soon. (Imagine buying a new set that becomes unusable only a few months afterwards.) And (3) even IF stores stop selling analog TVs, there are a whooole lot of USED sets sitting on the shelves of Goodwill, etc., that poorer folks would be likely to purchase in lieu of a new set. What are we going to do -- pass a law that says you can't sell used analog TVs anymore? No, this whole thing will be a problem until people can walk into a department store and buy a digital TV for the same as (or just a little more than) an analog set. (Budget-minded consumers are used to getting a 13" for $49-59 on sale, a 19-inch for maybe $89-99, etc. I mean, I realize those kinds of sets almost fall into the category of "loss leaders" now, but does it really cost THAT much more to make a digital capable set than a comparably sized analog unit? Or is the profit margin on those things simply that much higher?) Then achieving the transition through attrition and depreciation makes sense -- just maintain analog service for those who need it, switch them to digital when they replace their sets, and only pull the plug totally on analog cable when the percentage of analog subscribers falls below XX%. It will be interesting to see how it all shakes out. As long as it doesn't impact what *I* want to watch, I'm cool with it. (Stan Jones, Orlando FL, May 11, DX LISTENING DIGEST) TIPS FOR RATIONAL LIVING ++++++++++++++++++++++++ One of the gospel huxters re-exposed as a charlatan on ABC`s 20-20 Friday night was Peter Popoff, who is back on the air. Where? I did a search on Popoff at zap2it.com, and immediately got this: ``World-renowned Peter Popoff inspires you to riches.`` at a number of times, all in the 3-5 am infomercial range on seemingly reputable channels TLC, TRAVEL, and OXYGEN. And those are only the ones we get on Enid cable. Not reputable any more (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) THIS I BELIEVE There Is No God = by Penn Jillette, Morning Edition, November 21, 2005 Penn Jillette is the taller, louder half of the magic and comedy act Penn and Teller. He is a research fellow at the Cato Institute and has lectured at Oxford and MIT. Penn has co-authored three best-selling books and is executive producer of the documentary film The Aristocrats. “I'm not greedy. I have love, blue skies, rainbows, and Hallmark cards, and that has to be enough… It seems just rude to beg the invisible for more.” I believe that there is no God. I'm beyond atheism. Atheism is not believing in God. Not believing in God is easy -- you can't prove a negative, so there's no work to do. You can't prove that there isn't an elephant inside the trunk of my car. You sure? How about now? Maybe he was just hiding before. Check again. . . http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5015557 (also Listen link, via Inside CBC blog via DXLD) ###