ENIGMA 2000 Newsletter - Issue 19

November 2003
Articles, newsreports and Items of interest :enigma2000-owner@yahoogroups.com

Non number station radio observations

PoSW asks

"Has everyone noted the great chunks of noise inside some of the broadcast bands?"

and continues :

"They are always very strong and I think they are experimental transmissions for the new digital shortwave broadcast standard. Frequencies noted include 5,975, 6,095, 15,780 and most recently in October, 7,315 and 9,410 this last one logged with a massive signal on Saturday 11-Oct at 1150z and of special interest because it is a BBC World Service frequency.

Somewhat lower in the spectrum, in terms of both frequency and technology, broadcast activity noted on 252 kHz longwave observed in September. This frequency is allocated to the Republic of Ireland and for a while back in the nineties carried a pop music station "Atlantic 252" aimed at the younger generation but the limited audio quality obtainable from long wave did not go down too well in the era of CDs and MTV and the station folded a few years ago. There had been reports in Shortwave Magazine from time to time that the Irish state broadcasting organisation RTE was planning to use 252 kHz to relay their domestic service to a wider audience but I had heard nothing - until Saturday 6-September when I chanced to tune down the longwave band and found 252 ocupied by "RTE Radio 1" with a strong signal. It was interesting to hear a broadcast station in the English language (well, mostly!) from outside the UK with a mixture of feature programmes, current affairs, traditional Irish music and so on and gave the impression that it was actually run by grown ups in contrast with a lot of the dumbed down style of presentation of a large part of UK domestic broadcasting. It was on every day until Thursday 18 - Sept when there was no trace when I checked 252 at 1850z. It showed up again on the weekend of 27 and 28 - Sept but has not been heard since – shame!"

[TnxPoSW]

Manolis [Crete] writes

"And a reason why the ionosphere is amazing... Even if the conditions were bad these days, it is fantastic that propagation sometimes benefits a harmonic of a station and not its real frequency... I heard a Greek pirate's transmission on 9220kHz at 1312z.[29/10]. Possibly it was the 5th harmonic of 1844kHz which was barely audible!!!!"