Help record the 2024 BBC Antarctic Midwinter Broadcast later today (June 21, 2024)

Every year, the BBC broadcasts a special program to the scientists and support staff in the British Antarctic Survey Team. The BBC plays music requests and sends special messages to the small team located at various Antarctic research stations. Each year, the thirty minute show is guaranteed to be quirky, nostalgic, and certainly a DX-worthy catch!

After successful listener events from years past, I’m once again calling on all SWLing Post readers and shortwave radio listeners to make a short recording (say, 30-60 seconds) of the BBC Antarctic Midwinter Broadcast today and share it here on the SWLing Post. Details on this below.

Time and frequencies

Our intrepid contributor, Richard Langley, reports the following message from the British Antarctic Survey:

The BBC Antarctic Midwinter Broadcast will be transmitted at 21.30 GMT on 21 June on shortwave frequencies: 9585kHz, 11685kHz and 9870kHz.

Recording the Midwinter Broadcast has become an SWLing Post community tradition! Read our previous post for more details.

I’m especially fond of this broadcast as it always falls on my birthday and it’s always fun capturing this unique DX!

Share your recording and notes with us!

Comment with your recording!

During the Midwinter broadcast, I will publish a dedicated post where you can comment and include links to audio and video of your 2024 Midwinter Broadcast recordings. When this post is available, I will link to it here. This will allow you to post your logs and recordings at your convenience without my availability becoming the bottleneck.

So that there’s no confusion, I’ve turned off comments on this post so that comments are left on the appropriate article.

Here’s the format I’d like you to leave in your comment of the dedicated post:

Name:

Listening location:

Notes: (Include frequencies and any details about your receiver and antenna.)

Link to audio or video: (YouTube, Vimeo, Internet Archive, SoundCloud, etc.)

Video and Audio Recordings

There is no way to directly upload audio in your comments, however, you can link to the recordings if you upload them to the Internet Archive (which I’d highly recommend) or any of the video streaming services–like YouTube and Vimeo–or audio services like SoundCloud.

If you have a photo you’d like to include in your comment, send me an email from the same address you used in your comment. I’ll manually post the image at the top of your comment when time allows.

As with each year, I’ll make sure the BAS team and the BBC receive a link with all of your recordings!

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The Ionosphere’s a right old mystery

Hi it’s FastRadioBurst 23 here letting you know what the Imaginary Stations crew will be bringing to those shortwaves this week. On Sunday 23rd June 2024 at 0900/1300 hrs UTC on 6160 kHz and then at 2000 UTC on 6160 kHz and 3975 kHz they have another Name that theme show (WMMR) via Shortwave Gold. Like the last NTT show, it has a mystery theme running throughout and we ask our listeners to guess what that theme was, once the show is aired. There will be a special eQSL for the first correct winner. Tune in to find out more details on how to enter.

Then via WRMI on Wednesday 26th June 2024 at 0200 UTC on 9395 kHz there’s another version of WMMR. This time it’s a mystery mix which will contain all sorts of eclectic tunes pulled out of DJ Frederick’s record collection but even we don’t know what the show will contain. One thing it will be is interesting. Tune in and enjoy. More on WMMR below:

We now have a Patreon page for our regular listeners here. Monthly memberships are available for exclusive audio and zines.

For more information on all our shows, please send your collection of words with spaces in between to [email protected] and check out our old shows at our Mixcloud page here.

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The Anritsu RG52A: Rob spots this very rare receiver on eBay

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Rob Gray, who writes:

Hello Thomas.

If interested, the link below is to an extremely rare SW receiver:

Click here to view this listing on eBay.

[note: this is an eBay partnership link]

The latest Radio Receivers Past/Present book shows this model as a Japanese manufactured, commercial-maritime receiver. The Rarity is “Typically Unavailable”, and lists prices at $5,700 New, $800-1600 Used.

73,
Rob

Wow, Rob. I’ve never seen this receiver before. Perhaps one of our commercial receiver experts (*cough* Dan Robinson *cough*) might be able to shed some light on this model!

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Can you help Dan identify this mystery interval signal?

Photo by Sai Harish on UnsplashMany thanks to Dan Greenall, one of our dedicated Shortwave Radio Audio Archive contributors, who writes:

Hi Thomas

I was going over a few of my old cassettes today and discovered what seems to be an interval signal, but I cannot seem to place it.

Recording:

Unfortunately, all I can tell you is that it was made sometime in 1971.

I’ve done a little checking with Interval Signals Online but no luck so far. The recording is right at the end of a cassette and you can hear the tape run out abruptly, so no ID, language or frequency info is available.

[…]Any ideas about the mystery IS?

73

Readers: If you can help Dan positively identify this interval signal, please comment!

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Today: Uncle Bill’s Melting Pot features music from Haiti and the Dominican Republic

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Bill Tilford, who shares the following announcement:

Uncle Bill’s Melting Pot, June 15, 2024
On June 15, 2024, we will feature music from Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
Times & Frequencies (note new schedule) are:
1700-1800 UTC 9670 kHz with beam E-F towards South Asia (but quite good in Russia also)
1900-2000 UTC 3955 & 6070 kHz (omnidirectional for Europe and beyond)
2300-2400 UTC 3955 kHz (omnidirectional for Europe and beyond)

All transmissions from Channel 292, Rohrbach, Germany

Reception reports from websdrs (as well as regular radios of course) are honored with eQSLs IF
1. The entire program is reported
2. If a web sdr, which specific one is included in the report
Shorter reports will be acknowledged with a brief note of thanks.

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