Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Tom Ally, who writes:
I am not sure if you saw this in your email yet, but you can now pre-order the WRTH 2024 at https://wrth.info/preorder-wrth-2024/
During checkout, apply the code earlybird to unlock a 5% discount. Remember: Shipping is free!
Thanks for the tip, Tom!
An artist’s concept of NASA’s Voyager spacecraft. Credit: NASA
Welcome to the SWLing Post’s Radio Waves, a collection of links to interesting stories making waves in the world of radio. Enjoy!
Many thanks to SWLing Post contributors Paul, John Drake, William Lee, and Dennis Dura for the following tips:
Ham radio operators are sounding the alarm over the latest threat to their beloved hobby—and this time, it is coming from Wall Street.
A group of high-frequency trading firms are asking the Federal Communications Commission to open shortwave frequencies to greater commercial use, so they can use radio to zip financial data around the world in milliseconds.
Prominent members of the amateur-radio community say interference from traders’ broadcasts could ruin their hobby, which often involves tuning in to weak radio signals so they can chat with fellow hams in faraway places. Hundreds of hams have filed letters with the FCC opposing the traders’ proposal, and some have railed against the plan in YouTube videos.
Brock Fansler is among those speaking out. A 40-year-old Los Angeles resident with shoulder-length hair, he likes using his radio to send digital data about weather conditions to other hams.
He complains that the traders are looking to transmit with up to 20,000 watts of power, whereas amateurs are capped at 1,500 watts, and many use off-the-shelf radios with 100 watts.
“They’re asking for an insane amount of power,” Fansler said. “It’s like having neighbors move in with a drum set and guitar. This is going to be blasted all over the planet, with how much wattage they’re going to put behind it.”
The group behind the proposal, called the Shortwave Modernization Coalition, says such fears are overblown. The coalition—whose members include such trading giants as Jump Trading Group, DRW Holdings and Virtu Financial —says it has already been using shortwave for several years and there haven’t been any verified complaints of interference. [Continue reading at the Wall Street Journal, or via this article archive…]
In a dramatic bit of improvisation, NASA’ Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California, has managed to reestablish communications with the Voyager 2 spacecraft 12.3 billion miles (19.9 billion km) from Earth after losing contact on July 21.
On August 4, 2023, NASA engineers managed to make contact with the Voyager 2 robotic probe even though previous estimates were that this would not be possible until October 15. Contact was lost on July 21 after a series of commands sent included an error that caused the spacecraft’s antenna to point about two degrees away from Earth – a small shift that still managed to prevent the craft from maintaining radio contact.
[…]Since Voyager 2’s 20-W radio signal from the edge of the solar system is 1,000 times weaker than that of a conventional FM transmitter and can still be picked up by the DSN while off beam, the engineers reasoned that it might be possible to send a much more powerful signal from the DSN that Voyager could not ignore.
This “interstellar shout” was easy enough to set up, but putting it into practice took some patience because a one-way radio signal to Voyager 2 takes 18.5 hours to reach its destination and another 18.5 hours for a reply. That is a very nerve-wracking 37 hours.
Fortunately, on August 2, 2023 at 12:29 am EDT, Voyager 2 began returning science and telemetry data. [Continue reading…]
In addition, click here to read NASA’s updates directly.
Communications Minister Michelle Rowland acknowledged the commercial radio industry’s upcoming 100th birthday with a speech at Parliament House recalling the launch of 2WS in Seven Hills and the continued advocacy and up to date information that radio provides its communities.
Rowland spoke of her childhood growing up in Western Sydney saying:
“I’ll never forget the day that 2WS officially launched in Leabons Lane in Seven Hills. It was the first time that we felt recognised as a community by the media. Here were local voices telling the stories that mattered to us. We were being given at a platform at a time when Western Sydney stories weren’t always reflected in the news of the day coming from the CBD.
And now look how far our humble 2WS has come!”
Read more at: https://radioinfo.com.au/news/communications-minister-michelle-rowland-celebrates-100-years-of-commercial-radio/ © RadioInfo Australia
RED DEER COUNTY — The world became a little smaller late last month as the Central Alberta Amateur Radio Club (CAARC) held its annual Field Day at the Hillcrest Community Hall, at the corner of Township Road 342 and Range Road 22.
From June 24 at noon to June 25 at noon, members of the club competed to make as many contacts as they could on a wide variety of radio frequencies.
The goal was to do so without using regular power – utilizing portable generators or solar power instead.
When the Albertan was there, contacts had been made as far east as Finland and as far south as Arizona.
A forest of antennas of differing sizes and heights was set up and club members did their communicating in a nearby shelter.
The idea of the challenge, held worldwide, was to prove the operators’ ability to communicate to others without relying on traditional power in case of an emergency. [Continue reading…]
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RRI’s Tiganesti-based shortwave transmitter centre (Photo source: Radio Romania International)
Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Paul Walker, who shares the following news from RRI:
Two out of the five transmitters broadcasting RRI’s programmes are temporarily suspended as of 1 August
Dear friends, the Radio Romania Board of Administrators decided to temporarily suspend the use of 2 out of the 5 Radiocom shortwave transmitters that ensure the broadcast of Radio Romania International programmes, because of budget cuts. As of August 1, our programmes are aired via one transmitter in ?ig?ne?ti, one in S?ftica (both of them near Bucharest) and one in Galbeni (east). As soon as the budget of the institution is restored, we will resume broadcasts on all 5 transmitters.
The RRI programmes in Romanian, English, French, German, Spanish, Russian, Arabic, Chinese and Hebrew are affected. All of them may be received on only one frequency instead of 2, as of August 1, 2023. The frequencies as well as any other prospective changes operated by Radiocom further to reception monitoring and to your feedback on reception quality will be announced in our broadcasts, on our web page and on Facebook.
Budget restrictions also prompted a reduction of the night time power of medium wave transmitters that broadcast Radio Romania News and Current Affairs programmes and of some regional stations.
We invite you to follow RRI’s programmes online at www.rri.ro (including on demand), on SoundCloud, on Android and iOS apps, via TuneIn and via satellite. You can find more details on our home page. You can also follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, LinkedIn and Spotify.
Welcome to the SWLing Post’s Radio Waves, a collection of links to interesting stories making waves in the world of radio. Enjoy!
Many thanks to SWLing Post contributors Ulis Fleming, Mark Hirst, Mangosman, and Adrian Korol for the following tips:
The Global Jigsaw is brought to you by BBC Monitoring, a part of the BBC you may not have heard of. This team of journalists reports on media from 150 countries in up to 100 languages and provides information and analyses to BBC newsrooms and the UK government, as well as commercial clients including universities and thinktanks. It also has an intriguing and, at times, dramatic history dating back to the eve of World War Two. This bonus episode is all about us.
Audio PlayerVendors knew all about it, but most customers were clueless.
For more than 25 years, a technology used for critical data and voice radio communications around the world has been shrouded in secrecy to prevent anyone from closely scrutinizing its security properties for vulnerabilities. But now it’s finally getting a public airing thanks to a small group of researchers in the Netherlands who got their hands on its viscera and found serious flaws, including a deliberate backdoor.
The backdoor, known for years by vendors that sold the technology but not necessarily by customers, exists in an encryption algorithm baked into radios sold for commercial use in critical infrastructure. It’s used to transmit encrypted data and commands in pipelines, railways, the electric grid, mass transit, and freight trains. It would allow someone to snoop on communications to learn how a system works, then potentially send commands to the radios that could trigger blackouts, halt gas pipeline flows, or reroute trains.
Researchers found a second vulnerability in a different part of the same radio technology that is used in more specialized systems sold exclusively to police forces, prison personnel, military, intelligence agencies, and emergency services, such as the C2000 communication system used by Dutch police, fire brigades, ambulance services, and Ministry of Defense for mission-critical voice and data communications. The flaw would let someone decrypt encrypted voice and data communications and send fraudulent messages to spread misinformation or redirect personnel and forces during critical times. [Continue reading…]
The station aims to inform about the Antarctic activities that are carried out in the different Argentine bases, to disseminate the country’s culture to the rest of the world and also to “Malvinize from Antarctica”, highlighted its coordinator, Juan Benavente, in dialogue with Télam
Antarctic identity, sovereignty over the Malvinas Islands and inclusion are the axes of the programming carried out by LRA 36 Radio Nacional “Arcángel San Gabriel”, installed at the Esperanza Base in Argentine Antarctica , from where almost 44 years ago it began broadcasting on different frequencies to around the world and that this year it has been developing a series of technical and content innovations to amplify its dissemination strategy.
Regardless of the national situation, the station aims to inform about the Antarctic activities that are carried out in the different Argentine bases, to spread the country’s culture to the rest of the world and also to “Malvinize from Antarctica”, reflecting not only testimonies of war veterans but also of stories that unite sports and education with the archipelago, indicated its coordinator Juan Benavente.
As in the case of the “historic” communication made on March 15 with the Argentine marathon runner Daniela Badra when she was in the Malvinas to participate in a competition and which was broadcast to the world via short wave band during the “Uniendo Voces” program. . “This was something that filled us with emotion, it is something that had never been done before,” said Benavente, in dialogue with Télam.
Its inauguration in October 1979
LRA 36 broadcasts to the world on shortwave and is currently the only station on that band in the country. It works jointly with Radiodifusión Argentina al Exterior (RAE) – in charge of the experienced producer Adrián Korol – and they are listened to from places as far away as Alaska, Iceland or Japan, according to the latest reception reports. It also transmits by modulated frequency with local reach and a few years ago added streaming over the internet. [Continue reading in English, or in the original Spanish version…]
Many thanks to Mangosman who writes:
It’s now happened https://www.radio.gov.pk/30-07-2023/marriyum-aurangzeb-performs-groundbreaking-of-pbcs-digital-transmitter-in-rawat
$US 14 million is the price
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Welcome to the SWLing Post’s Radio Waves, a collection of links to interesting stories making waves in the world of radio. Enjoy!
Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor Dennis Dura and Tracy Wood for the following tips:
Committee gives the legislation a green light
On Thursday morning, the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation officially passed the AM For Every Vehicle Act on to the Senate floor. The executive session was broadcast live and facilitated by committee chair Sen. Maria Cantwell, a Democrat representing Washington state.
The ranking Republican, Sen. Ted Cruz, supports the measure, saying in a statement that “AM radio is vital to free expression and viewpoint diversity” and “allows Americans, especially conservatives, to communicate their points of view and help free speech flourish.”
The legislation was passed via a voice vote, and, while not every senator’s vote was recorded, the National Association of Broadcasters said Sen. Gary Peters, a Democrat from Michigan, asked that he be recorded as a ‘no.’” Michigan is home to the U.S. automaker industry, which opposes the AM For Every Vehicle Act. The Alliance for Automotive Innovation, which has a base in Michigan, recently said, “Congress has never mandated radio features in vehicles ever before.” It called the bill unnecessary. [Continue reading…]
Littlejohn and Mullinax describe recent projects to protect and extend its investment
At a time where the viability of the U.S. AM broadcast band has come under the microscope, what’s the prevailing attitude of iHeartMedia and the 250 AM properties it owns and operates?
Continue to invest, says Jeff Littlejohn.
“iHeart is still focused on AM radio as a medium,” said the company’s executive vice president of engineering and systems integration. “We see the importance AM has not only as an entertainment medium, but for news and information.”
Among other things, Littlejohn strongly believes in AM’s importance for emergency weather coverage. Perhaps nowhere is that more evident than in South Florida.
In addition to being an iconic AM signal dating to the 1920s, iHeartMedia’s news/talk 610 WIOD in Miami has received notoriety and awards — including regional recognition from the Associated Press — for its breaking news and weather coverage, notably during Hurricanes Andrew, Katrina and Wilma. [Continue reading…]
Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Tracy Wood, who writes:
I continue to enjoy the blog. Yes, those radio sets that appear in Spanish TV (and in the movies) are great! Lots of Grundigs, Philips, Telefunkens, and national brands.
Here are the two items
(1) Swan Island
At one time this was the home to Radio Swan, the US-funded anti-Castro clandestine radio station on AM and shortwave of the 1960s. Now Honduras wants to convert it to a prison island
https://time.com/6295724/honduras-islas-del-cisne-prison-island/
For more details see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_Swan
(2) Equatorial Guinea
Thanks to WorldRadioMap for originally posting this audio link [note that this playlist must be downloaded and used with an audio streaming application]: https://rrsatrtmp.tulix.tv/tvgeradio/tvgeradio/playlist.m3u8
Yes. Radio Nacional de Guinea Ecuatorial, Malabo, is now streaming on the Internet. The main language is Spanish but I suspect other languages may be heard. The hosting company (out of Atlanta) handles both their TV and radio streams. The TV channel’s website is https://tvgelive.gq/ but there is no radio-specific website yet.
As a reminder, the country’s other station is commercial – Asonga Radio. It is owned by the president’s son. Audio is at https://asongaradio.com/
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Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Don Moore–noted author, traveler, and DXer–for the latest installment of his Photo Album guest post series:
A Coruña coast
by Don Moore
Some of my favorite sites to visit while traveling are historical, marine, and military museums. I’ve always been interested in those subjects and sometimes those kinds of museums have a few old radios on display. That makes a nice bonus to the visit. Last year, I spent May and June traveling all over Spain (with some short excursions into neighboring countries). One of my favorite regions was Galicia, where I stayed for five nights in the capital of A Coruña and six days in a rural village to the east. And the museums of Galicia had some of the most interesting radio-themed items I’ve ever seen.
Galicia is that small region of northwestern Spain directly north of Portugal. It was part of the Celtic world (along with Brittany in France and the British Isles) and the coastline was home to Phoenician and Greek settlements. It later came under Roman rule along with the rest of the Iberian Peninsula.
A Coruña Fishing Boats
A Coruña Fish Market
Spanish is spoken everywhere but the people are proud of their native language, Galician or Gallego. The language looks and sounds like Portuguese with a lot of Spanish influence but is actually older than either of those. Some linguists believe that Portuguese was derived from Galician.
The rugged Galician coast is one of the most beautiful I’ve ever seen with its numerous bays, estuaries, steep hillsides, and rocky shore. Most of Spain is arid but Galicia is one of the rainiest parts of Europe so the countryside is green and lush. And because of the neighboring cold Atlantic Ocean, temperatures remain comfortable even when the rest of Spain (and places further north) are baking in the summer heat.
A Coruña City Hall
One of the first places I visited in A Coruña was the Museo Nacional de Ciencia e Tecnología on the west side of the harbor. The very first display in the museum is a piece of radio history like no other. In the 1960s NASA set up a network of communication stations around the world to maintain constant contact with the Apollo moon missions. The primary stations were located in rural California, near Canberra in Australia, and in the little village of Fresnedillas outside Madrid. When Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on the moon in 1969 Madrid was facing towards them and received the first radio transmissions from the surface of the moon. This museum has one of several redundant radio racks that were used to receive that historic broadcast.
After visiting the museum I wandered uphill to Monte de San Pedro Park, the best place in A Coruña to view the city and harbor. Those heights were also once vital to the city’s defenses and the park contains several mothballed gun turrets built in the 1930s. Continue reading
Many thanks to a number of SWLing Post contributors who have reached out about a report on AWR Wavescan regarding the closure of the BBC Kranji relay station in Singapore.
I contacted AWR Wavescan host, Jeff White at WRMI, and asked for any details he might have since I could not locate any press release from the BBC or Encompass.
Jeff shared the following notice from AWR Wavescan:
Another shortwave station is about to go off the air for good also. Encompass TV reports that the BBC relay station that Encompass operates in Kranji Singapore will cease operation as of July 16th, after many decades of service. This will result in a reduction of BBC English transmissions to South Asia. Some transmissions from Kranji will be moved to other shortwave transmitter sites.
Many thanks for the info, Jeff.
We’ll post more details about the closure as they become available.