Thursday, September 15, 2016

Pictures from the Pier

I've been enjoying Thursday evening listening to the radio while getting some work done. There has been all sorts of music coming out of the speakers here, courtesy of a handful of pirate broadcasters from the Netherlands.

One of the best signals tonight came from Wadloper, who was joined in the studio by Relmus, and together the Pier Clan were on 1646 for a good few hours blasting away some great music. They sent me these pictures from the studio while they were on air. You can see the antenna mast, stretching up into the night sky, together with the transmitter, variac, which controls the power supply, and the power meter.



 

When Wadloper closed down, the Witte Raaf, also from Friesland, came on the air and continued the music. His signal has had some super peaks, like most of the stations on air tonight, including Napoleon on 1629 kHz, Bluebird (1638) and Radio Alice, usually to be heard on SW but on 1620 tonight. That's the first time I've heard him on 1.6 MHz. Hopefully it won't be the last. And perhaps tonight will go on a bit longer than I expected - Barones signed on 1625 kHz a few minutes ago!

I made some recordings tonight as usual, and you can get a real flavour of how the pirates were coming through tonight.
 



Midweek breakfast surprise
The sun is rising here at about 0645 at the moment and, as I've mentioned before, it's not easy to catch pirates at this location during the daylight hours, so I had a nice surprise on Wednesday morning when at 0800 local time there was a signal coming through on 1636 kHz on the Lowe HF150 receiver. 



Reception came up quite nicely after a few minutes and the signal was perfectly listenable. I had my suspicions I was tuned in to
Radio Havanna who always uses this frequency and gets a very good signal into the UK. When I could still hear the signal at 0900 I was sure it was him. And sure enough came the ID.

I'm looking forward to the clocks going back an hour next month so that more early morning reception of the Dutch guys is possible. There are plenty of stations who don't transmit at night which means I don't get to hear them very often.

And here's what I've been listening to over the last few days:

Thursday, September 15, 2016
1620          1955         Alice 35333 music programme
1629          1956         Napoleon 33433-45444 music programme
1638          1957         Bluebird 55444 programme
1646          1957         Wadloper 45444 music programme
1646          2017         Zwarte Bizon 42433
1615          2047         Uniek 35333-45444 music programme
1645          2104         Witte Raaf 35333-45444 music programme
1625          2231         Barones 55444-55555 music programme

Wednesday, September 14, 2016
1636          0700         Havanna 25322 music programme
1620          2122         Vloedgolf 45444 qsoing
1629          2124         Noordzee 35333-45444 music programme
1613          2130         Monte Carlo 45343 qsoing
1633          2131         Barcelona 54444 qsoing
1620          2215         Mi Amigo 33333-44444 report for Noordzee
1640          2216         Professor Sickbok 55444 report for Noordzee
1625          2231         Pandora 55444-55555 music programme 

Tuesday, September 13, 2016
1620          2300         Barones 55444-55555 music programme



Monday, September 12, 2016
1660          2115         Blackbeard 35443 music programme
1615          2116         Uniek 45444 music programme
1640          2117         Veronica 35333-45444 music programme
1634          2120         Melkbus 35333 music programme
1645          2138         Monte Carlo 35343 report for Veronica
1620          2206         Monaco 34333 report for Uniek
1635          2206         Monte Carlo 35443 report for Uniek  
1626          2206         Melkbus 35333-45444 report for Uniek
1641          2219         Casablanca 55444-55555 report for Uniek
1628          2225         Melkbus 35343 qsoing
1624          2241         Jeneverstoker 25322 qsoing


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