The Hearing and Un-Hearing of HEARD ISLAND

A vid clip of my Radio Shack 200629 receiving Australian ham VK1A, working US stations from his location just outside Brisbane, Queensland, during the CQ World Wide contest, the night of Oct. 26th, 2024 (Oct. 27th UTC). The ID of VK1A is right near the end of the clip.

Over this past weekend, there has been a 'contest' on the Shortwave Ham bands. These contests have been around for ages -- the bigger ones usually happen two or three times a year, where you'll tune the ham bands and they will actually be crowded with signals, with hams eagerly trying to contact as many other hams as possible

When I was younger, I would buy CQ Magazine periodically. It's a magazine dedicated to the ham hobby. There are articles on how to improve your antennas, and there would be schematic diagrams of projects hams and other radio hobbyists could build. And there would be articles on DXpeditions (where a team of hams will transmit from some rare island out in the ocean somewhere), and also the results of contests.

A QSL Card for Qatar ham station A7XB, a station I heard on 15 Meters long ago, on my Yaesu FRG-7 and 80-100 ft. outdoor wire antenna. It was my most memorable DX catch. I had tuned into a couple guys -- with American accents -- talking. The signals were weak. The one guy seemed to be in Qatar and the other guy had an unusual DX call -- maybe Indonesia or Afghanistan? I don't remember, and I never got his call right. He might have been part of the US diplomatic mission in one of those countries. When A7XB mentioned his callsign, and spelled out his location ("Q-A-T-A-R"), suddenly there was a churning barrelhouse of signals -- all these 10's or hundreds of hams trying to contact him to get Qatar in their logs. I never did find out who the ham actually was, and never heard him again. Even DX Callbooks didn't show up anything. This QSL Card I found on E-Bay, by chance last year, is the only verification I've got for a very rare reception.

 

One year there was a big article on a guy in Belgium who won the CQ Worldwide DX contest -- I don't remember which year, it was probably in the 1980s. There was a pic of him, sitting proud in front of his several, large and expensive ham radio rigs, and also some pics of his antennas, which -- if I remember correctly -- were very impressive.

Now, this weekend a similar contest is taking place, on sideband. So, for the first time in recent memory, the ham bands are fairly close to packed with all sorts of SSB signals -- it's just like it would be on a typical Saturday afternoon on 20 Meters back in the 80s-00's when the bands were always packed. Not so much anymore -- crap propagation and inactive hams, as well as those running the clown car noises on FT8 have made the bands more spare.

But, this weekend, the bands are very busy.

A map of CQ Magazine's 'DX Zones', with the 'Zones' being designated by the people at CQ Magazine, which sponsors the Contest. During the Contest, individual hams (or teams, in a club) try to get as many contacts as possible, from as many of these 'DX Zones' as possible.

Last night I decided to tune around. 20 Meters, of course, was dead except for one guy calling CQ Contest from the Netherlands -- PJ2T, on 14318. He was alone on the SSB section of the 20 Meter band. And although I could hear him readably on my 24 ft. indoor wire and DX-394, he had no takers, except one American ham, K3DXX.

So I tuned down to the 40 Meter ham band. I had a lot more luck. The band was packed. I logged Brazil, Japan, Barbados, Mali, a bunch of hams from all over the US, and -- at least for a while -- I thought I logged Heard Island!

HEARD ISLAND? NO.... NOT REALLY

Heard Island is a remote island that is south of Kerguelen (the Antipodes of WA state, the exact opposite side of the world), which means it's out in the middle of frozen nowhere in the Southern Indian Ocean. So, why did I think I heard Heard Island? Because the guy in Australia, VK1A, had a web page that indicated that he was transmitting from Heard Island [please see screenshot of the page below].

Here you can see what threw me off: the unusual VK1 ham prefix (Australian prefixes are generally VK2-VK7 for each State, with VK1 being ACT, the Australian Capital Territory -- I've never heard ACT), and this page, which clearly denotes this station as being on Heard Island. Obviously -- it's a joke, or somebody, either at the site or elsewhere, typed in the absolutely wrong geographical coordinates.

This is a Ham Radio Station Prefix map. Maps -- and lists -- help you identify the country of the station you just heard. This map may be hard to read, but it -- and others like it -- are available online. I used to have a small book that had a map just like this inside it.

VK1A's QRZ page (QRZ.com is sort of a clearinghouse of info on ham radio stations) didn't have a location (the location only is available if you are logged in, and if you are not a ham, even if you are logged in the information available is a bit restricted). His QRZCQ page of course, was another matter. QRZCQ.com often has a lot more location info available, and QRZCQ said this VK1A guy was on Heard Island. 

The latitude and longitude coordinates -- which somebody had to take the time to type in -- gave the latitude and longitude for Heard Island as well.

I made a recording of my catch, still thinking there was something awry about the location. The operator didn't speak with an Aussie accent, but he's Dutch originally, so that would figure. I even heard him on my Radio Shack 200629, which is an able receiver on SSB but not as good as my DX-394, DX-398 (out of batteries right now) or Panasonic RF-B45.

Anyway, I moved on and listened some more and then went on with my household chores -- feeding my three cats, making some celery soup for myself, etc.

So then I looked up the station again. VK1A -- very little info on his QRZ page, or his main QRZ page (he has several callsigns, apparently quite active). No info whatsoever on ANY ham operating out of Heard Island, even during a contest. No real bio. Just a bunch of callsigns he's used over the years.

I finally logged into QRZ (after signing up), and being logged in more location info appeared. 

It turns out that the guy's up in the hills just north of Brisbane, and the weird VK1 prefix (not a standard Australian ham call prefix) is for contesters and clubs. Why the misleading info on QRZCQ.com? Maybe someone was having a joke? Maybe they typed in the latitude and longitude coordinates too hastily? I've seen misplaced locations on QRZCQ before, but not 7000 miles off.

So, there ya go. I had thought I'd heard Heard Island, but I had NOT heard Heard Island.

But I did get a clear copy of a guy from Brisbane on my Radio Shack 200629, which actually is a decent catch for that radio and an indoor wire. In fact, VK1A came in as well on my 200629 as he did on my DX-394, which is one of my best two radios for SSB and CW. It may have been that the conditions were up. Either way, I'm still happy with the DX catch -- even if it wasn't in the Indian Ocean. :-)

And, in the process, I found out that Heard Island has numerous glaciers, and its mountain, 'Big Ben', is the tallest mountain on Australian territory (although most Aussies think of Kosciusko as the country's tallest one). And -- no one, meaning absolutely no one -- lives there.

Here's a pic. And remember, if it looks cold, it IS cold. Nothing lives there but elephant seals and some penguins.

A picture of Heard Island, located south of Kerguelen, in the Southern Indian Ocean. The mountain is Mawson Peak, part of the mountain complex called "Big Ben". Big Ben is still volcanically active. No one lives on Heard Island, aside from elephant seals, penguins, and some other birds.

Here is an article on Heard Island's volcanic activity, courtesy the Australian CSIRO.

Blowing the lid off the volcanic story of Heard Island - CSIRO

I will post a couple more short articles within the week.

I hope my readers are all doing well. It's almost Winter here in Seattle, although the temperatures have been more or less moderate for it being this late in the year. I hope that holds.

Racofrats, when a kitten, Oct. 23, 2011. Such a long time ago.

I'll close this article with a pic of my cat Racofrats, when he was very young -- still a kitten. He's on my lap, looking to attack the other cats when they go by. He's the survivor of that litter. I call him Rac-a-doodle. He's turning into an indoor cat now. The plush, antique chair on the upstairs landing is all his, as is the cat furniture there.

Peace,

C.C. October 27th, 2024

Shortwave Mystery: Roaring Jet Noises in 20 Meter & 10 Meter Ham Bands

A pic of my Radio Shack DX-394, when I was tuned to a mystery, RTTY signal on 14002 kHz (the readout on USB on a DX-394 reads 1 kHz low -- so '14000.8' = 14002, roughly) (Readout on LSB is pretty accurate, within 50-100 Hz).

The past few evenings and mornings I've been tuning my Radio Shack DX-394 into the Shortwave ham bands. The DX-394 is a pretty good radio if you live in a low signals area, as I do. I got my DX-394 a long time ago -- in 1998. It was made in March of 1997, about a year before they discontinued the DX-394.

That said, at least three times I've noticed this strange, noise anomaly just outside the top edge of the 20 Meter Ham Band. I also recently noticed the same -- or similar -- anomaly at least once in the middle of the 10 Meter Ham Band. The noise propagates, and there is some fading, which indicates it probably isn't local RFI -- although I won't rule that out, as I'm not necessarily an RFI expert (RFI is Radio Frequency Interference, for those of you who aren't SW Radio aficionados). Interference from your neighbor's house isn't going to fade from S0.5 to S4 and back down again, irregularly.

First I noticed this anomaly on 14356 kHz, just over a week ago. The second frequency where I heard it was 28191 kHz, and there the noise/signal was definitely fading, from S4 down to S0 and back up again, and it wasn't regular in its fading pattern. Ten minutes later when I checked for it, it was gone.

It's one of those mystery noises we Shortwave and Ham Listeners encounter when we tune the bands. Sometimes it can be a noise from your electronics in your home, or your neighbor's home, or even somewhere in your neighborhood. Some radios have internal noises that can interfere with genuine signals coming over the atmosphere. Some noises -- like Over The Horizon Radar (called 'OTHR' by SWL's) -- can have distant sources (like China, Russia, or the US) and be intermittent, and they do not always sound the same. They can sound like pulsing noises, or even buzzing noises -- as OTHR can be sent with different numbers of signal pulses per second.

There are also noises on the Shortwave bands that may be military or scientific in origin -- and there are SW enthusiasts who spend a lot of time trying to ID or track them.

I'm not one of those people. I can ID most of the sounds I heard on the Ham Bands (CW, USB/LSB, FT8, Olivia, RTTY, etc.), and I can ID the sound of an OTHR (usually), and I can ID coastal CODAR noises (which sound like sweeping noises that often cover wide swaths of the SW spectrum; it is used to measure ocean waves near the coastline), and a lot of RFI I can ID, but I can't always ID the stranger noises I hear on HF and SW.

UNIDENTIFIED JET NOISE -- PHASING AND PROPAGATING on 14356 kHz

And this is one of those occasions. It is a roaring, phasing, propagating 'jet noise'. It sometimes appears just above the 20 Meter Ham band. I asked a Radio forum about this -- I posted a question about the mystery noise on the HF Underground, an excellent forum for anyone who is a Radio hobbyist, DX'er, SWL, or SW anomaly enthusiast. One of the guys who responded asked if I had any recordings. I had made two recordings, taken from my phone -- so they sound tinny. The two clips, sounding as they do, are the best I've got. Being that I couldn't post them on the HFU site, and that I don't have a YouTube, I figured I'd post the clips here, for what it's worth.

Here's a link to HFU, for those interested. If you like SW or Radio DXing at all, there will probably be something of interest here on this site. The HFU Wiki also has a lot of info on the stranger stations and noises you'll often hear. I found out about the Desert Whooper using the Wiki on this site (as well as a thread dedicated to that cool sounding, 4096 kHz, mini-beacon).:

HFU HF Underground - Index

So, here are the clips of the 'Jet Noise', centered on 14356-14357 kHz, the first of which I took after 2 a.m. Pacific Time, about a week ago, on July 19th, UTC. This signal was fairly wide, ranging about 3-5 kHz each side of 14356 kHz. That is why on one clip the readout says 14356, the other says 14355 -- the signal is fairly wide in spectrum.

'Jet' noise, Radio Shack DX-394 + 25 ft. indoor wire, 14357 kHz, 0916 UTC (2:16 a.m. Pacific). July 19th, 2024.

'Jet noise', 14356 kHz, Radio Shack DX-394 (+ 25 ft., indoor, second story wire), July 17th, 2024, 11:05 p.m. Pacific, 0605 UTC.

A MYSTERY RTTY TRANSMISSION ON 14001 kHz

Here is another recording, that I took this morning, when I was tuning the high HF ham bands on my DX-394 again. This was in the 20 Meter Ham band -- some RTTY (Radioteletype / FSK sounds) at 14001-14002 kHz. I first noticed it around 1418 UTC (7:18 a.m. Pacific Time). It was propagating, and a weak signal, less than S1 on a scale of S1-S5. It was getting stronger and weaker as I listened to it. It was weaker when I checked it again at 1438 UTC. I did get a phone recording of it, so I am posting it here. As for the frequency being reported as 14001-14002, I never know exactly where to zero the signal, and even if I did, I can't read it anyway....

UNID RTTY/FSK, weak, inside the lowest reaches of the 20 Meter Ham Band, Radio Shack DX-394 + 25 ft. indoor, 2nd story wire; July 24th, 2024, 7:08 a.m. Pacific, 1408 UTC.

The reason this is interesting is because RTTY and FSK (Frequency Shift Keying, which is a term that covers all sorts of RTTY style modes) aren't allowed (or just aren't done) in the lowest part of the 20 Meter Ham band. Two to three weeks ago I heard a very loud RTTY / FSK station on this same exact frequency, around 2 a.m. my time, 0900+ UTC. Another DXer said he had logged that station also, and he believed it was some sort of 'intruder', which can happen in the Shortwave ham bands.

Being that the propagation would probably favor either the Western half of the US, or Asia, my guess is that this RTTY intruder may be Asian in origin, but that is just a guess. The times I've heard it, there usually is some Asian activity either on the 20 Meter ham band, or the SWBC bands are open to Asia. 

These "intruder" stations can be fascinating to hear, be they ham pirates (illegal stations using the ham bands), or government and military agencies, and the like. The most famous intruders are the mysterious "Lima Pirates", operators who chant together on the airwaves (it's a type of game, actually), in the lower reaches of the 40 Meter Ham Band. I wrote about them in an article last month, which you can read here. The article also has some pretty good YouTube sound recordings of them.:

Interrock Nation: 'Lima Pirates': the Bizarre Mystery of the Chanting, Indonesian Pirate Ham Radio Operators in the 40 Meter Band

There are plenty of mysteries and anomalies that occur in the Shortwave spectrum. A lot of the strange sounding signals are explainable by those in the know. There are SWL's who thrive on recording and ID'ing these signals, usually lumped under the term "Utility Signals", because they serve a purpose other than entertainment -- they are military, aeronautical, scientific, or maritime transmissions.

Often you need special equipment to ID or otherwise decipher these signals, and many -- because of their military and governmental nature -- are not decipherable at all, but the experts usually can ID the type and mode of signal they are.

For the rest of us? You just learn to track them by ear and log them down. :-)

FIRING UP MY YAESU FRG-7!

Well, that's the latest Shortwave goings-on that have been happening here at my location. I still have an article on the DX-394 in the works, and I've also started one on my venerable 1979 Yaesu FRG-7, which I recently fired up again after years just sitting in the corner of my DX room.

After exercising the controls to clear the dust and oxidation from them, the radio worked perfectly! I am working on an article about it that I will post in a couple weeks. Here are two vid clips, one of an Indonesian ham sending Morse Code in the lower reaches of the 20 Meter Ham Band, and another clip of China Radio International's broadcast in Turkish.

This morning had a couple surprises. First off, the 40 Meter Band was mostly dead, except for some Californians talking on LSB on 7199 and 7185 kHz. 40 Meters is usually fairly open to Asia in the early mornings here. 

The logo of a Brunei ham I heard earlier this morning on my DX-394, on 14013 kHz. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to get a recording of him. He sent good, clean CW/Morse code, and had a good, S1-S2, mostly readable signal. A little later I heard YB0E_T contacting US hams in CW also on 14013 kHz.

On 20 Meters, though, I heard the Indonesian ham, and a different guy contacting US and other hams in Morse Code, and he was in Brunei, sending Code on 14005 kHz. For those who aren't geographically savvy, Brunei Darussalam is a small, independent country on the northwest coast of Borneo, surrounded by Sarawak, East Malaysia. I looked up the ham after I logged his callsign, V85NPV, and V85NPV builds all of his own radios. Quite good, obviously, with electronics!

Here is a link to his QRZ page, where there are pics of all the radios he has built from plans, and from scratch.:

V85NPV - Callsign Lookup by QRZ Ham Radio

This following clip is of the Indonesian ham sending Morse Code early this morning. His call was YB0E_T (because of his fast sending speed and the fading I couldn't ID the entire call accurately) and he was looking for contacts with US stations. He had a solid CW signal both on my DX-394 and FRG-7, and got a few contacts, mainly from Californians. Here you can hear him sending "CQ USA". As you can tell, the FRG-7 is a great receiver for CW, although the bandwidth can be a bit wide for separating out signals. This particular a.m., there wasn't a ton of activity in that part of the 20 Meter Band to have to separate signals, though.:

Indonesian ham YB0E_T sending "CQ USA" in CW/Morse code. Approx. 14013 kHz, FRG-7, 25 ft indoor wire. After 1410 UTC.

This is a recording of China Radio International broadcasting to Turkey and the EU in Turkish. The location of the transmitter is probably Kunming, in Yunnan province in south central China. The frequency is 13710 kHz in the 21 Meter Band, and the time I heard this was 1504 UTC (9:04 a.m., Pacific Time):

Well, that's about all for this time around.

Until next installment,

Peace.

C.C. July 24th, 2024.

ADDENDUM, September 17th, 2024:

I neglected to update this article after a guy on HFU -- Thomas in Germany -- listened to my MP4 vid clips on here, and he said it sounded like a STANAG mode used by military (probably from an Australian military transmitter, at Humpty Doo, in northern Australia). The STANAG in question may be STANAG4285. 

There are a lot of modes used by military operations, and STANAG is one of them. I'd heard of STANAG, but never learned to identify it. Apparently buried in the jet noise is a form of digital transmission. 

Humpty Doo would fit, propagation-wise, as the time I heard the transmission was when the 20 Meter Band was open to Asia and Oceania.

Here's the link to the HFU thread I made about the 'Jet Noise'.:

UNID Jet noise, 14356-14357 kHz, S4 (out of 5) & propagating, 0824 UTC (hfunderground.com)

A shout out to everyone from HFU who has visited the blog -- from my Stats page I can tell there are at least a couple. Peace.