Shortwave Log, Northern Germany, July 2012

============

Radio Damascus (9330 kHz)

Radio Damascus suspended its broadcasts on shortwave for some time in July¹⁾, but the signal is now back, with varying signal strength. Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg‘s (RBB) shortwave editor notes that reportedly, the station’s technicians couldn’t reach the transmission site in Adra, east of Damascus, because of fightings on the route there. The RBB notice cites no source; maybe it was an announcement by Radio Damascus itself.

Last night (August 1), both the German and the English-language broadcasts, at 18:05 and 20:10 GMT respectively, were affected by complete signal failings, especially during the German-language broadcast. Signal strength during the first twenty minutes or so after 18:00 UTC was about O=2, i.e. barely readable at times, and O=3 (readable, except during the blackouts) after 20:05 UTC.

–

Radio Damascus shortwave QSL, 1980s)

–
============

Recent Logs

International Telecommunication Union letter codes used in the table underneath:
ARG – Argentina; F – France; IRN – Iran; RRW – Rwanda; SYR – Syria.

Languages (“L.”):
C – Chinese; E – English; F – French; G – German.

–

kHz	Station	Ctry	L.	Day	Time GMT	S	I	O
21780	Deutsche Welle (Kigali)	RRW	F	July 23	12:02	4	4	4
11700	RFI Paris	F	F	July 29	07:14	5	4	4
21650	IRIB Tehran	IRN	C	July 29	12:00	4	5	4
93302)	Radio Damascus	SYR	E	July 31	20:57	2	4	2
15345	RAE Buenos Aires	ARG	G	July 31	21:18	3	3	3

____________

Note

¹⁾ The absence from shortwave seems to have lasted for much of July’s second half. Last time I heard the shortwave broadcast before it was suspended was on June 27, but I only tried again on July 31 (see above) anyway. According to RBB on July 22, Radio Damascus was scheduled to resume its 9330 kHz broadcasts on July 29.

²⁾ From 4’40” on my recording on July 31 (see second-last entry in table above), the signal fails several times – arguably because of power failures.
[Update, December 23, 2012: now removed. If you are interested in the soundfile, please contact me by email or comment.]

Radio Damascus (or a fan club) provides podcasts with a pretty good sound quality here – usually uploaded within hours or days after the actual broadcast, and downloadable for about a week.

____________

Related

» Previous Logs, July 1, 2012
» Where’s the Iceberg, Febr 11, 2012

____________