Ninety-ninth edition of the N&O column / Spooks newsletter

(Date: Sun, 02 Oct 2005 23:01:18 +0200)

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Voice stations

E03

Lincolnshire Poacher idents. Compiled by Al.

First half of the month:

Second half of the month:

E03a (E04)

Cherry Ripe idents. Compiled by Tomonori.

First half of the month:

Second half of the month:

82509, 20389, 70807, 55107, 21226, 29133, 15075

Tomonori also reports a number of anomalies of Cherry Ripe.

• ID 70807 was sent at 0000 UTC on 6-9 while ID 02300 was expected.
• ID 02300 appeared at 1000 UTC on 6-9 while ID 24124 was expected.
• Cherry Ripe's transmission was already in progress at 1200 UTC on 16-9. The same happened at 1300 UTC.
• The reset cycle of the clock, which has a delay of 3.6 seconds per day, has been changed from 1 week to 1 month since 20 July.
• The call-up has been changed since 25/September. It is currently:
  Cherry Ripe tune x 12
  ID x 4
  Cherry Ripe tune x 12
  ID x 4
  Cherry Ripe tune x 12
  ID x 4
  Cherry Ripe tune x 12
  ID x 4
  Cherry Ripe tune x 12
  ID x 4
  Chime x 6
  and into 5FG x 2 .....
  In the past, the ID is repeated 10 times.
• The slot of each ID has been changed, but the frequencies and times seem to be the same.

Many thanks for sharing your observations, Tomonori san.

E10

E22

Frequencies: 15040 and 17385 kHz. The latter was sometimes a bit off frequency. 17386 and 17387 were measured. The accent sounds more Indian or Pakistani than Arabic. The station uses both male and female operators.

The following logs appeared on the Spooks and Enigma 2000 mailing lists:

V02 / M08

The Cuban station and its morse companion M08 are active as ever. See also our logs section. Mark has posted quite a few logs.

He also noticed that in week 38 the 0900/1000 UTC daily V2c sked has been using the time/freq slots for V2a format broadcasts. The same happened on 25-9; the 0900/1000 UTC expected V2c sked was again replaced with V2a broadcasts on 7887/7975 MHz. Mark says:

"At 1000z on 8174m, M8a up loud and clear, in progress. Then abruptly stops at about 1015z before the third message. After a pause, a weak V2c in progress was heard on 8173m. M8a never returned! The 1100z M8a on 3926m was supposed to be the repeat of 1000z M8a on 3926m. The 1100z should have been on 4173m, but the operator forgot to change freqs from the hour before!

The way the Cubans have been broadcasting this past year, you would think all the older ops have retired and the newer ones have taken their place. Late skeds, early skeds, no skeds, V2a instead of V2c or M8a and vice versa. It really is turning into a "comedy of errors" for these networks! I really wonder who is running the show in Cuba. Obviously, his/her superiors do not care about quality, and the poor recipients of these broadcasts must really get frustrated as to when and where a good quality message will arrive."

On the 26th Mark reports another change:

"It now looks like the six daily afternoon V2c skeds are now being changed over to V2a format. The two early morning skeds have already changed last week. The times and frequency schedule that V2c has been using for at least eight months is still being used by the new V2a skeds."

In a note from Tom we can read:

"I've noticed something interesting with the new switch to V2c for the 0900-1000 UTC transmissions. After each TX, almost around the top of the hour, the station repeat the header several times before signing off. I also think the 1000 UTC is a repeat of the 0900 UTC tx, just like it was with V2c. It is strange, but also pretty neat how this seems to be one of the most active numbers station when it comes to format changes."

Thanks for the reports, Mark and Tom. Much appreciated!

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