Hundred twentieth edition of the N&O column / Spooks newsletter

(Date: August 2007)

Utility round-up

Drift net buoys

DC sent me a couple of comments re. N&O 119.

"KW102 is almost certainly an MF drift net beacon; the 1700-1800 and 1900-2200 ranges in particular have a number of similar callsigns frequently. Incidentally, the movie "The Perfect Storm" has a brief scene in which one of these beacons is deployed from the boat at the end of a net."

Drift net buoys logged in August:

1806.5	CLOC	1804.3	FS4	1807.0	A2
1815.0	2AR	1823.0	B0Z	1825.0	3GL
1835.0	A31D	1840.0	XO	1861.0	AOE
1863.0	3FQB	1895.0	AN2	1923.0	3DMY
1932.4	SZ4	1955.3	CO29

28006.6	BD	28011.3	CZ	28011.7	DN
28016.2	BD	28045.9	EA	28071.5	NO
28081.7	DM	28091.4	CF	28094.6	HC
28096.0	CN	28096.1	HD	28096.3	BD
28101.4	BN	28111.0	BD	28111.4	C
28111.6	BN	28116.2	DN	28117.1	DN
28121.3	CM	28121.5	HD	28131.3	DO
28131.5	DU	28166.0	CN	28175.9	BD
28191.2	BN	28196.6	CN	28231.3	BD
28385.7	SB	28386.0	HD

Pirate beacons

4110.04 kHz: "T", probably located in Florida.

XX7 propagation tester

The Russian propagation tester is apparently still alive. I had not heard it or read a log in quite a while. Anyway, Klaus found it again. It transmitted on 22 August at 0706-0707 and 0706-0737 on 5207, 6207, ... 14207 kHz (frequency incremented by 1 MHz every 10 s). 10207 kHz uncertain due to QRM.

The transmissions were short FSK bursts around xx07, xx37, and on xx207 kHz.

Unid

Jim copied the following unid morse station on 9296 kHz at 1308 UTC on 3 August.
"ESAO ESAO (repeating) EEEEEEEE AOES AOES (repeating) AR. 722 39 03 739 8134 71 100 21 ABV 722 3903 739 813 44 71 100 21 511 3903 900 22 AR".

Eastern European military???