Category Archives: Recordings

Shortwave’s Giant: Carlos explores evangelical broadcasting to MENA

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor and political cartoonist, Carlos Latuff, who shares the following guest post:

WINNING HEARTS, MINDS AND…SOULS!

Catechizing via shortwave.

by Carlos Latuff, special for The SWLing Post

During the Vietnam War (1955-1975), the expression “hearts and minds” became popular and referred to the US government’s strategy to gain allies among the South Vietnamese against the Vietcong guerrillas. Over the years this strategy has been used in different contexts. What I’m going to talk about in this short article is how the radio waves have served Christian evangelical churches, to win hearts and minds, specially in Africa and Middle East (MENA).

Different from what I did with the Ethiopian clandestine broadcasts, when I spent around 3 months monitoring, with evangelical radios it took only two days in January 2022; quite simple, since they’re stations with regular programming. Most of them have good signal reception, there’s no jamming from other countries and, despite transmitting in different languages, little translation was necessary since the content is always the same: religious preaching.

All listenings happened in Rio de Janeiro. The radio sets used in this monitoring were the XHDATA D-808 and an old analog radio Sanyo RP-8351, made in Brazil in the 70’s. A 7-meter long wire antenna was used in all listenings. Continue reading →

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Carlos’ Shortwave Art and Recording of the Voice of Korea (12 Jan 2022)

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Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor and noted political cartoonist, Carlos Latuff, who shares yet another example of his radio log art, this time for The Voice of Korea.

Carlos notes:

Voice of Korea, 9650 kHz, broadcasting in Japanese from Kujang, North Korea.

Newsletter: Kim Jong Un watches test of new hypersonic ballistic missile.

Transmission with jamming, probably from South Korea.

Signal captured in Rio de Janeiro, 01/12/2022, 05:07, local time.

Click here to view on YouTube.

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Carlos Shares Shortwave Art and Recordings of Ethiopian Jamming and BBC News Tigrinya

Ethiopian Jamming

Characteristic noise of “jamming” (intentional interference), probably coming from the Ethiopian government, preventing reception of the signal from the clandestine broadcaster Dimtse Wegahta Tigray (Voice of the Dawn Tigray).

Dimtse Wegahta Tigray broadcasts daily to warring Ethiopia on the frequency of 15340 kHz, using the powerful transmitters of the company TDF (Télédiffusion de France) in Issoudun, France.

Captured at Parque da Catacumba, Rio de Janeiro, 12/29/2021, 2:36 pm (local time):

Click here to view on YouTube.

BBC News Tigrinya broadcasting from UAE to Ethiopia/Eritrea

BBC News Tigrinya, 12065 kHz, broadcasting from Al Dhabbiya, United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Excerpt from the news.
– Ethiopian party member EZEMA talks about the intention to form a cabinet in the government of Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed despite the war.
– US Embassy in Eritrea asks that country’s government to release political dissidents.

The BBC is among the news channels that are accused by the Ethiopian government of “spreading fake news”.

Signal received in Rio de Janeiro, 01/04/2022, at 3:14 pm (local time).

Thanks to yaredinho_r9 for the translation.

Click here to view on YouTube.

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Recordings of WI2XLQ: 2021 Commemorative Fessenden Broadcast on 486 kHz

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WA1ZMS’ 600 meter transmitter

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Brian Smith (W9IND), who shares the following recordings and notes:

Since 2012, experimental radio station WI2XLQ in Forest, Virginia, has presented an annual Christmas Eve/Christmas Day transmission in honor of Canadian radio pioneer Reginald Fessenden. Operated by Brian Justin, WA1ZMS, the station transmits on 486 kHz, just below the American AM broadcast band.

Here are two short recordings of the 2021 broadcast that I made around 9 p.m. on Christmas Eve (Indianapolis time) or 0200 UTC Christmas Day.

No DXing feat on my part: Unable to receive the station in the Indianapolis area, I listened via the online SDR of K1RA in Warrenton, Virginia, about 120 miles northeast of WI2XLQ.

My recording equipment? Again, nothing to brag about — just my trusty Android cell phone, which captured 4- and 6-minute snippets of the broadcast.

Signal strength varied widely from inaudible to excellent — mostly in between — and not surprisingly there’s plenty of QRN (static). The repeating program consisted of two songs, including a violin rendition of “O Holy Night,” followed by a station ID.

For those who’ve never managed to hear WI2XLQ’s annual transmissions, I hope you’ll enjoy this sampling of what you missed.

NOTE: As even Justin acknowledges, these broadcasts commemorate a reputed 1906 event that may not actually have taken place. Despite Fessenden’s claim of achieving the first voice (and music) transmission, substantiation is lacking. Whatever the truth, Fessenden was unquestionably one of the foremost radio experimenters of his era.

Recordings:

Many thanks for sharing this, Brian!

Note that if you missed the WI2XLQ on Christmas, note than Brian Justin plans to repeat the Fessenden broadcast on New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day!

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Carlos’ Shortwave Art and Recording of Dimtse Wegahta Tigray (Voice of the Dawn Tigray)

Carlos’ Shortwave Art and Recording of Clandestine Republic of Yemen Radio

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Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor and noted political cartoonist, Carlos Latuff, who shares another example of his radio log art, this time for clandestine station, Republic of Yemen Radio.

Carlos notes:

Republic of Yemen Radio, 11860 kHz, Saudi Arabia’s clandestine broadcaster broadcasting political propaganda to Yemen, a country that has been undergoing Saudi military intervention since 2015. Excerpt from a romantic song by the famous Yemeni singer Ayoob Tarish.

Signal picked up in Rio de Janeiro on Euro 12, 2021 at 6:03 pm. I thank Suhaila Abdel Latif for the kindness of the translation.

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Guest Post: Don targets rare Norwegian stations during Newfoundland DXpedition

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Photo by the Bjørnøya Meteorologiske Stasjon

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Don Moore–author of Following Ghosts in Northern Peru–for the following guest post:

The Rarest DX?

By Don Moore

In mid-October I received an invitation to attend the annual DXpedition in Cappahayden, Newfoundland with Jean Burnell, John Fisher, and Jim Renfrews. It didn’t take long for me to say yes. Newfoundland is one of the best places in the world to DX from and all kinds of amazing stuff has been heard there. I was excited at the prospect of great medium wave DX and being able to log low-powered European private and pirate shortwave broadcasters.

But something else was at the top of my try-for list. One of my many DX interests has always been logging coastal marine stations in the 1600 to 3000 kHz range. In preparation I started checking online sources to update my spreadsheet of schedules. In going through a recently added section on Marine Broadcasts in the DX Info Centre website I came across listings for twice-daily weather broadcasts from Hopen Island on 1750 kHz and Bjørnøya (Bear Island) on 1757 kHz.

I didn’t remember ever seeing anything about broadcasts from these remote islands in the Norwegian Arctic before. Were these stations actually on the air, I wondered. And if they were, could I hear them in Newfoundland? Continue reading →

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