Check out this article from Radio World which addresses the state of shortwave radio broadcasting.
Jeff White of WRMI and Kim Elliott of the VOA are both interviewed. Elliott even speaks about the virtues of the VOA Radiogram experiments which have had success circumventing shortwave radio jamming (broadcasts which were completely omitted from the BBG Special Committee report on the efficacy of shortwave radio).
The First Pirate is the title of a Radio 4 Extra–an interview with Les Woodland who tells the story of Captain Plugge, founder of Radio Normandy, the first station to take on the BBC.
(Source: Southgate ARC)
Capt Leonard Plugge was the driving force behind Radio Normandy in the early 1930s. He created the International Broadcasting Company in 1931 as a commercial rival to the British Broadcasting Corporation by buying airtime from radio stations such as Normandy, Toulouse, Ljubljana, Juan les Pins, Paris, Poste Parisien, Athlone, Barcelona, Madrid and Rome. IBC worked indirectly with Radio Luxembourg until 1936. World War II silenced most of Plugge’s stations between 1939 and 1945.
One of my favorite shortwave stations for music, besides ERT Open (former Voice of Greece), is All India Radio (AIR).
Since their broadcasts originate on the other side of the planet (from my North American location), their signal bounces off the ionosphere many times before I ever hear it. I actually like the result of this; the static of space makes their already beautiful music sound even more textured, enhancing the distance of its source, and heightening the music’s sense of mystery and nostalgia.
I recorded this AIR broadcast on August 14th, 2014–around 20:45 UTC–on 9,445 kHz. You can download the MP3 by clicking here, or simply listen in the embedded player below. Enjoy!
SWLing Post reader, Neil, writes:
“An app specifically made for the Elecraft KX3 is KX3Companion (www.kx3companion.com). There are free and paid versions on Google Play (does not work on Kindle Fire).
The same author has created KX3 KeyApp to give a virtual set of keys for KX3 users. It comes with two predefined templates (CW, and default) with KX3 macros setup for use.
Finally, he created QRSS Beacon – A fully featured QRSS (Slow CW) Beacon on Android. You can select a DIT duration from 1 to 60 seconds and choose one of the 3 supported modes: QRSS, FSK/CW and DFCW. This works on any radio, connect the audio out of your Android device to the audio in of your radio and an enable VOX.
Also, HamLog is available on iOS & Android (there’s even a MAC version).”
Many thanks for sharing this, Neil! I will add the KX3 Companion apps to our comprehensive list of ham/shortwave radio apps.
Many thanks to Jonathan Marks who apprised me of this excellent 1960 film from the BBC. As Jonathan notes, it’s heavily scripted, but fascinating nonetheless.
Click here to view the full video on YouTube or watch via the embedded player below:
If you enjoyed Garth Mullins’ radio documentary “End of the Dial” you might also enjoy his follow up, “Snow on the Dial-The Voice of Denendeh Falls Silent.”
Mullins also produces the podcast, East Van Calling, which focuses on radio and various social justice issues in Canada. Subscribe to East Van Calling via SoundCloud:
https://soundcloud.com/garthmullins/sets/east-van-calling-podcast
(Source: Russia Today via YouTube)
“From a lonely rusted tower in a forest north of Moscow, a mysterious shortwave radio station transmitted day and night. For at least the decade leading up to 1992, it broadcast almost nothing but beeps; after that, it switched to buzzes, generally between 21 and 34 per minute, each lasting roughly a second—a nasally foghorn blaring through a crackly ether.
The signal was said to emanate from the grounds of a voyenni gorodok (mini military city) near the village of Povarovo, and very rarely, perhaps once every few weeks, the monotony was broken by a male voice reciting brief sequences of numbers and words, often strings of Russian names: “Anna, Nikolai, Ivan, Tatyana, Roman.” But the balance of the airtime was filled by a steady, almost maddening, series of inexplicable tones.”
Click here to watch the video on YouTube, or view via the embedded player below:
If you can’t hear UVB-76 from where you live via shortwave radio (4,625 kHz), you can always listen to this live stream.