[HCDX] Glenn Hauser logs April 16-17

[Glenn Hauser <wghauser@xxxxxxxxx>]

** BURMA [non]. South Asian music on 11540, April 17 at 1419, fair with deep slow fading. Missed any announcement around 1430 since I was mainly listening to KUNM`s excellent call-in show, Thursdays at 1400-1500. 11540 gone at 1438 recheck. Per Aoki this is RFA Burmese via Tinian at 1330-1430 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** CANADA. CRI in Chinese, very weak on 15260, April 17 at 1415, // and synchronized with Sackville on 15220. This could be easily explained as a leapfrog mixing product over Sackville 15240 Sweden relay --- except 15240 was not on the air at that time! Furthermore, CRI is on 15260 via Sackville, before, not after 1400. So I guess this 15260 was a plain old spur, or maybe a transmitter that was not turned completely off. Nothing to match on minus 40 kHz from 15220, 15180, other than a very weak carrier from something (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** COSTA RICA [and non]. REE relay, 5970, 1237 April 17 in Spanish, phone interview, muffled modulation, confirmed by // 15170. Mixing with something in Korean, which by 1251 had gained the upper hand. That`s YFR via Komsolomsk, per Aoki. Strangely enough, this Cariari relay was not 1 kHz off frequency but almost on-frequency, producing a SAH varying slightly around 5 Hz. This REE transmission is scheduled M-F only at 1100-1400 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** CUBA [and non]. There was marked improvement in audio quality between Arnie Coro in the body of DXers Unlimited, and the standard closing with theme music; I believe this was on one of the frequencies around 0555 UT Wednesday April 16, tho I did not log it. Seems that before this, the standard closing, which is the same recording every time, had better matched the degraded telephone-quality audio that Arnie has explained he deliberately uses for better intelligibility during the show. Perhaps they have re-done it, or neglected to run it thru the same audio degrading process as the new content of the show.

CRI relay on 9570, partially missing April 16, was totally missing April 17 at 1246 in Chinese, and after 1300 in English. This transmitter has been ailing for a long time. Wonder if any other CRI relays or even RHC frequencies are missing in other dayparts?

DentroCuban Jamming command grinding away against nothing on 5980, April 17 at 1253, long after R. Martí had closed at 1200. They may fear that Martí will play games with scheduling to thwart jammers, but seems to me Martí stays right on its registered frequency schedule, no matter what (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** ECUADOR. HCJB, 11960 in Spanish, caught two ID breaks April 17. They still don`t announce frequencies, so they can`t be wrong; at 1314 gave a long E-mail address which I couldn`t copy but it had radiosembramiento (?) in it, as in planting seeds; at 1329 it was the P-mail address instead (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** MEXICO [and non]. Looking for XEXQ, 6045, April 17: at 1241 only a weak carrier, probably Hohhot, Inner Mongolia, while XEOI 6010 was coming in well, so I don`t think SLP was on the air yet. Rechecked at 1255 I could hear bits of classical music fading in and out, so seems they turned on the OC transmitter sometime in the interim. I would really like to hear a SW sign-on, but I fear they just turn it on when they get around to it, joining AM or FM programming in progress. There was now a low almost audible het, as others have measured this 50 or 60 Hz low, vs the Asian carrier. XEXQ signal was a little better at 1304, still classical music rather than morning news program.

This is from the Autonomous University of San Luis Potosí; many Mexican universities have ``autonomous`` in their names, notably UNAM in México DF which operates another SW station, currently silent, on 9599.3v. I can`t think of any US university which has Autonomous in its very name, so why is this done in Mexico? The word means self-governing, so are they independent of any government control? That seems unlikely. Of course, in Commie countries, `Autonomous` means NOT self-governing, e.g. TIBET (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** NEW ZEALAND [and non]. RNZI, April 17 at 1242 check, could not detect DRM on 6165-6170-6175 as scheduled, nor AM on 9655, tho there was an extremely weak carrier in the skirts of Sackville 9650, whilst RA was inbooming on 9580 and three lesser 31m frequencies, so I wonder if RNZI was off the air, or on wrong frequencies again? Not found on 7145 either. But at *1300, good on new 6170 AM with news. Meanwhile, ex-6095 had weak Firedrake audible against BBC, // 6085. 6170 still holding up at 1350 with mix of pop and Maori music, but losing out to noise level by 2 am news at 1400, which is 125 minutes after sunrise in Enid today (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** U K [non]. Another check of BBCWS Spanish to Americas, via Furman 9410, VG signal April 17 at 1246 during another top-10 countdown. This is how BBCWS spends its money to serve the public with its mandate to be the world`s most trusted news source? 

Well, it is presented in Spanish, as they said ``en quinto lugar, Mariah Carey, Touch My Body``, and then she sang it in English! OK, I wouldn`t mind doing that, but What Would Lester Do? // much weaker GUF 11860 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** U S A. Weak station in English on 11560, fading in and out April 17 at 1318 talking about The Holy Father, so must be WEWN. At first I wondered if they had moved from 11550 to avoid Cairo collision, which does not start until 1500, but 11560 is already scheduled at 1100-1400 to SE Asia, then 1400 onwards in Spanish on 11550, where still heard at 1418 check (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)

** VATICAN [and non]. RV`s printed A-08 schedule folder, metermarked 8 April, has arrived in the P-mail. At first glance the transmission grid looks quite explicit and well-organized. Each target area (or rather azimuth sector) is indicated by a letter from A to Z, conveniently, now 26 of them! These are in two groups, one close-in for Europe, and the other far-out for the rest of the world. Explained thus:

``Capital letters following frequencies indicate the radiation direction of the antennas. Omnidirectional service when capital letters are omitted.``

MW and FM frequencies have no capital letters, tho both COULD be direxional if desired or needed. But some of the SW frequencies are also letterless, and I know they are NOT omnidirectional. 

They are instead relays from sites other than SMG, which VR refuses to acknowledge! That would require more maps, each centred on a relay site, inconvenient. But does VR also not want its uninformed SWLs to know that they have entered into relay deals with a number of other broadcasters, some even ex-Communist? You would never know about them by looking at this folder.

Claiming to be omnidirexional from Vatican rather than direxional from Sackville, for example, are 9610 and 6040.

Also letterless is Chinese at 1230-1315 on 6020 and 9900. 6020 we know is RVA Philippines, as it ruins reception of R. Australia even here during that semisesquihour, as reconfirmed April 17 at 1240 and 1254 chex. Per Aoki, 9900 is Novosibirsk at 111 degrees. There are quite a few others which I will not go into here, as anyone can look them up in the online references.

More anomalies in the RV sked: certain transmissions are marked with a Maltese cross, denoting they are liturgies, such as 0730 Mass in Italian on Sundays and Holy Days. Why, then, is the Mass in Latin, daily at 0530, not so marked?? A throwback to the old days when Latin was suppressed? Surely the traditional Latin mass should now overshadow those in mere XXI century vernaculars.

This is also an opportunity for me to repeat my perennial complaint that VR never shows the END time of transmissions. You may guess that they are about 5 minutes before the start of the next transmission, but there is not always any next transmission in a given group! And not all languages in a given group are of the same length.

The text article in the folder is about Travelling with the Pope, as he is currently in the USA, and many other visits abroad are scheduled this year. Refers to http://www.radiovaticana.org where you will find the times of live broadcasts. I have already checked the frequently updated Special Broadcasts page http://www.radiovaticana.org/coorpro/entrasmisspec.htm – a link to which is not easy to find on their web pages, and not given in the folder either. 

Sometimes papal visits provoke special SW transmissions on special frequencies, but none at all shown for the current visit to USA, just lots of special live transmissions on satellite and on MW, FM in the Roma area (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ###


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