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MUMBAI: In the wake of recent earthquake that affected Nepal and India, All India Radio (AIR) and British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) have designed special programming for affected areas of Indo-Nepal border and Nepal respectively. AIR is also transmitting services through their External Services Division (ESD).
AIR stations in Patna, Darbhanga, Gorakhpur, Lucknow, Gangtok, Siliguri, Guwahati, Delhi and others put out suitable programmes to generate awareness among the masses, particularly informing them how to tackle such situations.[…]
My pal, @K7al_L3afta, recently posted the following recording of the Nepal emergency amateur radio net via Twitter:
He also recorded this short segment relaying that A65DR is alive and well:
@K7al_L3afta is using a PL-660 in an RFI-heavy, urban environment in Morocco. Even knowing some of these operators are using high power, I’m impressed the PL-660 is getting such good reception.
If you have SSB mode on your receiver, you can try monitoring some of the Nepal emergency nets on 14,205 and 14,215 kHz USB.
As you can see from the screenshot of the Elad spectrum display above, Radio Romania International’s signal was quite strong. Earlier in the day, the FDM-S2 could also easily hear the RRI English service on 11,700 kHz, which was much weaker at my location here in the eastern US.
Shortwave transmissions will return for an experiment next weekend. From transmitters in Sweden, and on a couple of frequencies in different bands, we offer an afternoon of programming from 14:00 to 16:00 GMT on Saturday, 25th April, aimed at listeners in Europe. (3 – 5pm UK time, 4 – 6pm Europe).
Programme details on the April issue of Radio News. Hear us in the UK, Ireland and most of Western Europe on 9,405kHz (31.87m); and Scandinavia and Northern Europe on 3,975kHz (75.47m).
Thursday night at 00:00 UTC, I was pleased to hear the interval signal of one of my favorite pirate radio stations: Radio Casablanca.
“Rick Blaine” fired up his AM transmitter and pumped out some amazing WWII era music on 6,940 kHz for well over one hour and a half. This is the first time I’ve been able to catch Radio Casablanca in well over a year (click here to listen to previous recordings).
Close your eyes and imagine what it must have been like to hear the great bands of the era over the shortwaves…
Radio Exterior de España has posted an updated broadcast schedule (in Spanish) on their website. I have translated and pasted the shortwave schedules below:
Radio Exterior de España transmits its programming from 18:00 to 22:00 hours, Coordinated Universal Time, Monday through Friday. Broadcast frequencies and coverage areas are:
Africa and South Atlantic, 15,450 Khz , 19 meter band.
South America, 17,715 Khz , 16 meter band.
North America, 17,855 Khz , 16 meter band.
Middle East and Indian, 15,490 Khz , 19 meter band.
And on Saturdays and Sundays:
Africa and South Atlantic, 21,620 Khz band of 13 meters (14 to 18 hours), and 15,450 kHz band of 19 meters (18 to 22 hours).
South America, 17,715 Khz band of 16 meters (14 to 18 hours).
North America, 17,855 Khz band of 16 meters (14 to 18 hours).
Middle East and Indian, 15,490 Khz band of 19 meters (14 to 18 hours).
(In case you’re keeping tabs: yes, REE is still on the air, though basically as a relay of RNE.)
DW’s relay station in Kigali (Source: Deutsche Welle)
Yesterday, Deutsche Welle transmitted its final broadcast from the Kigali, Rwanda relay station. Since I’ve only had moderate luck hearing the Kigali site the past few days–especially on 31 meters–I fired up the TitanSDR Pro (which is still currently under review) and set it to record all three final afternoon broadcasts from Kigali on 12,005, 15,275 and 17,800 kHz.
As you can see from the screenshot above, Kigali produced a very strong signal on 17,800 kHz. The TitanSDR recorded the full broadcast, starting with one minute of the transmitter tuning, then one hour of DW’s French language service, followed by one hour of DW’s Hausa language service…then the transmitter went silent.
The recording begins around 1659 UTC on March 28, 2015 on 17,800 kHz:
Kigali’s early days
Last week, SWLing Post reader Bob LaRose (W6ACU) sent me the following message and scans:
“Here’s some nostalgia from [when the Kigali relay] opened, 50 years ago!”
Bob then followed this with another email:
“I dug into the “vault” and I found [the] 1964 Third Quarter issue of “Hallo, Friends” from Deutsche Welle that talks about the “new” Kigali station as it was being built. The 1965 issues did not cover the actual inauguration.”
