firedrake logs, oct 2015

Firedrake has interested me for a while, but I didn't log it at all in 2014. Recently I've been enjoying the UTwente WebSDR thanks to mentions from LondonShortwave on Twitter and my friend Dan. So I thought that would be a useful resource to look for Firedrake again. I found that it's still very active and can be found on a number of daytime and nighttime frequencies.

During 21-24 Oct 2015, Firedrake was located on these frequencies (kHz):

5890 (1800, 2000, 2100 UTC)
5970 (2000 UTC)
7435 (2100 UTC)
7505 (2200 UTC)
9355 (1800, 1900, 2000 UTC)
9370 (2200 UTC)
9685 (2100 UTC)
9745 (1800, 1900, 2000 UTC)
11560 (1800 UTC)
11945 (0100 UTC)
13830 (1100 UTC)
17625 (0500 UTC)
17810 (0600 UTC)

This is a consolidated version of my logs arranged by frequency. Times shown are simply the hour during which the transmission was identified; some receptions were only a minute long.

The target of all of these jamming transmissions, by my recollection, was Radio Free Asia. I saw at least two mentions on Twitter of Radio Free Asia receptions. One was a description of music, the other was a YouTube video. Radio Free Asia is a news broadcast, and the jammer is loud orchestral music. When identifying a station, it's important to ensure that the format is a match, as well as the date, time, frequency, and region (taking things like propagation and greyline location into account).

However, Radio Free Asia itself is not a source of broadcast frequencies for its Cantonese broadcasts. On their broadcasting schedule page, recently updated for the B15 period, the Cantonese schedule is indicated with Frequency Not Promoted.

brief radio romania international log

25 Oct 2015, 2350 UTC. I've been listening on and off to Radio Romania International, English on 6015 kHz via the UTwente websdr. The broadcast was loud and clear, with the S-meter hitting S9+40. After they read a huge list of social networks in which they participate, they announce that their programming is also available on mobile phones. I was expecting to hear about some smartphone app or another, but instead they gave out a United States phone number.

At the close of the hour, the announcer (or a recording) stated that programming was also available in WMA, MP3, and AAC+ formats. They gave out the email address engl@rri.ro. Then I heard their standard closing melody of nine notes repeated until an abrupt end of the signal at 2357 UTC.

uvb-76 buzzer on 6998 khz

The mysterious broadcast known as S28, UVB-76, and The Buzzer is commonly found on 4625 kHz USB. In the past few days, I and others found an identical broadcast on 6998 kHz USB. Here's a waterfall image of the broadcast from the UTwente WebSDR, on 23 Oct 2015 at 0125 UTC.

shortwave scanning, 30 sep 2015

30 Sep 2015, 1933-2015 UTC (daytime), San Francisco, CA, USA. Frequencies in kHz. Broadcasting data from short-wave.info; city distances from geobytes. Eton E5 with ceiling-mounted random wire antenna.

15480: Adventist World Radio, Arabic (Madagascar; 10600 mi / 17060 km)
15580: Voice of America, English (Selebi-Phikwe, Botswana; 10356 mi / 16666 km) -- very weak, fading
15730: Voice of America, French (Greenville, NC, USA; 2477 mi / 3986 km) -- strong and clear
15825: WWCR, English (Nashville, TN, USA; 1960 mi / 3150 km)
17530: Voice of America, French (Greenville, NC, USA; 2477 mi / 3986 km) -- weak
17730: Radio Havana Cuba, French (Bauta, Cuba; 2565 mi / 4128 km) -- 1940 UTC
17730: Radio Havana Cuba, Portuguese (Bauta, Cuba; 2565 mi / 4128 km) -- 2000 UTC
17765: WHRI Overcomer, English (Cypress Creek, SC, USA; 2292 mi / 3690 km)
17855: Radio Exterior de España, Spanish (Noblejas, Spain; 5800 mi / 9325 km)

I've logged the long-distance Botswana VOA broadcast earlier this month, but to my knowledge I've never logged a broadcast from Madagascar before now.

pdf: introduction to beacon dxing

While searching for more information related to the longwave non-directional beacons I have been recently seeking, I came across this PDF.

Introduction to Beacon DXing by Alan Gale, G4TMV