Twenty-sixth edition of the N&O column / Spooks newsletter

(Date: Thu, 01 Jun 2000 12:28:22 +0200)

Morse stations

Unid station

CR reported a very active unid station that popped up on 5277 kHz in the first week of May. The station moved to 5326 kHz later on and is on the air from 0600-???? UTC. It is possibly a military station from Belarus or the Ukraine. Information is most welcome.

The time that the station uses is UTC+2. They put a zero in front of the date. Message numbers increase by ten (12, 22, 32, 90, 100, etc). Callsigns change several times a day. When not sending messages, it transmits a VVV marker every 15 minutes.

Formats:

Date/time groups

22020905 22: msg nr, 02: date (May 2), 0905: UTC + 2 hrs
12090908 120: msg nr, 09: date (May 9), 0908: UTC + 2 hrs

Message formats.

Three different formats were noted so far.

Format 1: VVV markers

MX2N MX2N MX2N VVVVVVVVVVV VVVVVVVVVVV VVVVVVVVVVV AR JPTP JPTP JPTP VVVVVVVVVVV VVVVVVVVVVV VVVVVVVVVVV AR

Format 2: 5LGs or 5FGs.

Each message consists of 20 groups.

L8KT L8KT L8KT DE J2V4 J2V4 J2V4 QTC AR L8KT L8KT L8KT DE J2V4 J2V4 J2V4 QTC 12020901 = LMXPM NAWQT KVUPD HIHQS XUBUR MFUFV KDVHY WHNHS YLEZF CHUZS PMUTG UCWSK TNDZP EJVNO ZBLTY BCUKE UQGFA EVWGA AXDGD SZXLZ AR

L8KT L8KT L8KT DE J2V4 J2V4 J2V4 QTC AR L8KT L8KT L8KT DE J2V4 J2V4 J2V4 QTC 22020905 16314 65034 60831 86120 80162 17140 46724 49060 85616 12093 36313 46935 18061 37968 14387 59575 82938 27202 69836 29579 AR

Format 3

KW2P KW2P KW2P DE JPTP JPTP JPTP 284 686 318 386 886 886 340 731 COL 284 686 318 386 886 886 340 731 AR

ICJM ICJM ICJM DE JPTP JPTP JPTP 284 686 326 386 886 886 340 731 COL 284 686 326 386 886 886 340 731 AR

Channel markers [MX]

-L-

Joerg pointed me to the website of Det. A, 600th USASA in Ravenna, Italy. The 'L' marker is mentioned there. They even put a message from 'L' on their website. Nice :-)

The message reads:
CT CT CT
BT LFGBFCIX1UPV24
BT BBB
NNN NNN
BBB
NNN NNN
DDX DDD
NNN NNN
BT AR

-R-

I received two questions about the location of the Russian military station 'R'. As its location, both Ustinov and Izhevsk were mentioned. So, what is right?. Well, Izhevsk is the historic name of the place that was renamed in Ustinov during the USSR days. The city is now using its old name again and I will use Izhevsk from now on.

-F-

Takashi reports that in Japan channelmarker 'F' is heard a lot in all cluster bands (5154, 7039, 8495, 10872, 13258, 16332 and 20048 kHz).

-K-

Occasionally 'K' is heard on 5154 and 7039 kHz. 'K' is slow-keying usually with a « dirty distinctive hum », says Takashi.

-E-

'E' is very rarely heard on 5154 kHz.

Russian air defence [M21]

M21 has changed its schedules and was heard on the following freqs in May:

7950.0 kHz	1000 UTC
3213.0 kHz	2036 UTC
4802.5 kHz	2254 UTC
7987.0 kHz	0143 UTC