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Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor and KSKO Program Director, Paul Walker, who shares the following announcement:
Tune in for two hours of nothing but Christmas tunes December 23rd and it’s extra special because it’ll be a live worldwide broadcast of KSKO on Shortwave!!
From 2200-2400UTC 2300-0100UTC (2pm Alaska, 3pm Pacific, 6pm Eastern) we’ll be live across Europe on the 250,000 watts of Spaceline Bulgaria’s 5900 kHz transmitter along with the 100KW WRMI 7570 kHz covering North America and the 100KW WRMI 9955 [Updated to 5085] kHz covering Latin America.
I’m footing the costs out of this out of my own pocket just for the heck of it!
I’m so glad you’re doing this again, Paul! We look forward to tuning in!
W9IMS Special Event No. 1: The 2022 Certificate Chase Begins
By Brian D. Smith, W9IND
A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step, as the proverb goes, and the road to a 2022 W9IMS Checkered Flag Award begins with a single QSO – or a single SWL reception.
W9IMS will stage special event stations commemorating each of the three major races at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway this year: the Grand Prix, the Indianapolis 500 and the NASCAR 200 at the Brickyard.
Your weeklong opportunity to complete the first of three required contacts with W9IMS starts Sunday, May 8, and ends at 11:59 p.m. Saturday, May 14 (0359 UTC Sunday, May 15). The special event schedule will resume only 8 days later with the Indy 500 operation (May 23-29), followed by the NASCAR 200 from July 25-31.
Individual QSL cards accompany each of the three events, and a Checkered Flag certificate awaits those who bag the trio. Hams and SWLs alike may apply for the cards and certificate; see www.w9ims.org for further information.
Where to find W9IMS? The station fires up on 20- and 40-meter General Class frequencies, usually on or near 14.245 and 7.245 MHz. But the easiest way to locate W9IMS is to check DX spots, especially on DX Summit at http://www.dxsummit.fi/
Type “W9IMS” in the search box at upper right and you’ll see which, if any, frequencies the station is currently occupying. Note that special event operations are not continuous throughout the week, but you’ll find scheduled times and operators on the W9IMS QRZ page – and there’s always the possibility of unscheduled appearances by operators with an hour or two to spare.
Any hour of the day or night is fair game, but the surest way to catch W9IMS is during prime time: weekdays from 6 to 10 p.m. Indy time or 2200 to 0200 UTC. And if all else fails, listen for happy hour – the last blast on Race Day (May 14 for the Grand Prix), usually starting at 11 p.m. Indy time or 0300 UTC. That’s when W9IMS ops traditionally switch to contest-style QSOs, exchanging only signal reports, to put as many stations in the log as possible.
Don’t stake your certificate on any announced schedule, however; W9IMS on-air times can be curtailed by adverse solar or weather conditions or a paucity of QSOs.
Likewise, the station has been known to activate an unannounced band, such as 80 meters, at the drop of a hat. Again, DX Summit and other DX spotting networks are your best friend in this regard.
Feel free to submit all of your 2022 QSL and certificate requests in the same envelope, and if you don’t have a QSL card, a printout of your W9IMS contacts or reception reports will suffice.
Join me, Paul Walker, on WRMI Shortwave for “The LIVE Friday Night Request Show Dance Party Thingy” being relayed from NPR/community radio station KSKO 89.5 McGrath, Alaska.
It’ll take place Saturday July 10th 0300-0500UTC on 7780kHz to the east coast US and Western Europe, 7730kHz to the west coast US, Canada along with Hawaii, and the South Pacific (NZ, Aus, etc) and 4980kHz to the Caribbean and South America.
I’ll be taking phone calls with requests with a number given out during the show as it’s truly
LIVE. No station money was spent for this, It’s coming out of my pocket just to have something different up on shortwave for a few hours.
The music during the show could be ANYTHING from any genre and any year. It’s a combination of what *I* want to hear and what listeners request. I’ve had Judas Priest, Garth Brooks and Weird Al Yankovic back to back to back during the Friday night show before because they were all request in that order by 3 different listeners.
A note: 5850kHz/7570kHz is beamed towards Vancouver, 7330kHZ is beamed towards the US/Mexico border according to Jeff white which affords 7730 better coverage of the Pacific Ocean region countries than 5850 or 7570.
Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Adrian Korol, who shares the photo above and video below of the LRA36 crew heading to the broadcast building on the Argentine Antarctic Research Station this morning.
Adrian has also provided the following broadcast schedule (in Spanish) for the anniversary program:
This frequency has not yet opened to eastern North America, but I will be listening today, all day. I have noted that there are few KiwiSDR stations in South America available at the moment. No doubt, listeners are taking up the available seats in hopes of hearing the anniversary broadcast.
I suspect this may be one of the largest audiences LRA36 has broadcast to over its 40 years on the air!
Post Readers: If you manage to capture a good recording of the broadcast, I’d love to post it on the Shortwave Radio Audio Archive.
Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Ron, who shares the following tip from the ARRL News:
Each year, volunteers at McMurdo Station, Antarctica, celebrate the holidays by serenading those at the remote, Antarctic field camps via HF radio. This year, ham radio operators and SWLs around the world are invited to listen in and email listener reports. The broadcast will be on Sunday, December 23, 2300 UTC (December 24, 1200 New Zealand Time), on 7,995 kHz USB.
Each year, the “residents” of McMurdo Station, Antarctica, celebrate Christmas by singing and sharing Christmas Carols via HF — using a non-Amateur Radio frequency just above 40 meters — for those at remote Antarctic field camps. They’ll be doing it again in 2017, on Saturday, December 23, at 2300 UTC.
“Multiple stations are involved, each with different equipment,” explained Nathaniel Frissell, W2NAF, an assistant research professor at New Jersey Institute of Technology who has been part of the chorus in the past. “McMurdo Station and South Pole Station probably have the most powerful equipment. Field camps and remote stations could be calling in with systems that put out as little as 20 W.”
Frissell said McMurdo Station would serve as a net control of sorts to coordinate the various broadcasts, which will include a small choir and vibraphonist John Piper at McMurdo. Other camps and South Pole Station each will have a chance to chime in.
“This year, we are asking ham radio operators around the world to listen in and e-mail short-wave listening reports telling us how far away the carols are heard,” Frissell said. “Last time I did this, almost all of the positive QSL reports were from South Pole Station.”
The broadcast will take place on December 23 on 7995 kHz USB at 2300 UTC, which will be Christmas Eve in some parts of the world. Frissell requests reports via e-mail. For a Christmas in Antarctica SWL QSL card, send an SASE to his home address. A YouTube recording offers a sample of last year’s transmission.
A graduate of Virginia Tech, Frissell started HamSCI, Ham Radio Science Investigation, which sponsored the Solar Eclipse QSO Party this past year. At NJIT, he works in the Center for Solar-Terrestrial Research,
