Richard Blaine, operator of Radio Casablanca, wrote and asked why the station didn’t appear in the table of ratio’s of listener posts vs message threads (broadcasts) in the Shortwave Pirate Radio 2015 – A Year In Review post. This ratio can be considered a proxy for the average number of listeners reporting hearing each broadcast for a station. Perhaps a sort of popularity rating.

I looked into calculations, and saw that table was limited to stations with 10 or more logging threads, while there were only 7 for Radio Casablanca. This resulted in some stations being cut off. So I re-ran the numbers, this time with no cutoff:

30,Drunken DJ Radio
27,WEAK
21,Pumpkin Patch Radio
21,Radio Trump
20,Native Radio
19,Girl Scout Radio
18,WPOD
17,Germany Calling
17,Generation Wild 100
16.8333,Wolverine Radio
16.4286,Radio Casablanca
16,W807
15.5,Hard Tack Radio
15.5,Radio Halloween
15.0769,XFM
15,Radio Cinco De Mayo
15,Crazy Wave Radio
14.5,Up Against The Wall Radio
14,KAOS
14,Sousa Station
13.5,New Horizons Radio
13,Mushroom Radio
12.5,Free Thinker Radio
12.5,Nordic Wind Radio
12.234,Radio Free Whatever
12,Edmund Fitzgerald Radio
11,NRUI
11,Radio Enterhaken
10.8571,Random Radio
10.8,Radio Gallifrey Intergalactic
10.75,Pirate Clip Radio
10.6842,Burn It Down Radio
10.6667,Twangy Radio
10.2456,The Crystal Ship
10,Big Boobs Radio
10,WAHR
10,Rcok and Roll Radio
9.5,Northwoods Radio
9.5,Appalachia Radio
9.33333,Radio Clandestine
9.18182,WMID
9.10667,XLR8
9,WKND
9,Radio Marlene
9,COOLAM
9,D.B. Cooper Memorial
9,Hummingbird Radio
8.85714,THX1138
8.85714,X Minus One
8.83333,WRR
8.75,Peskie Party Radio
8.5122,Ghost Shortwave
8.29412,Insane Radio
8.28571,Undercover Radio
8.25,WREC
8,XEROX
8,Frederick Chopin Radio
8,WPDR
8,Ringo
8,Pirate Nation Radio
7.85714,KCPR
7.66667,CYOT
7.6,KHAT
7.55556,Channel Z
7.5,Radio Azteca
7.4,Brockett 99
7.25,Renegade Radio
7.2,Radio Broadcaster
7.07692,Radio True North
7,KIPM
7,WGWR
7,WHJR
7,WPIG
7,Channel X
7,Big Johnson Radio
7,Radio Mirror Park
6.95,CKUT Relay
6.9375,Rave On Radio
6.85714,Canadian Radio After Dark
6.85714,Radio Fusion Radio
6.80556,Amphetamine Radio
6.75,Javelina Radio
6.66667,WBOG
6.66667,WOLF
6.50746,Liquid Radio
6.5,Captain Morgan
6.33333,Cool AM
6.33333,Boombox Radio
6.25806,Moonlight Radio
6.25806,PeeWee Radio
6.2,WHYP
6.07143,BBC Pirate Radio
6,Radio Free Mars Radio
6,Halloween Radio
6,KBOX
6,Kid From Brooklyn
6,Muffin Man
6,Evil Elvis Radio
6,SIRIUS XM Relay
6,Friday Night Radio
5.88889,Blue Ocean Radio
5.85714,Happy Hanukkah Radio
5.75,Radio Ga Ga
5.66667,The Bangalore Poacher
5.66667,Weather Control Radio
5.66667,CPRRS
5.6,WJD
5.58108,Cold Country Canada
5.5,WLIS
5.4,Partial India Radio
5.33333,Pirate Radio Boston
5.33333,Network 51
5.25,WEZY
5.2,Radio Illuminati
5,NOEL
5,Solar Centric Radio
5,Hobart Radio
5,Christmas Radio
4.66667,Radio Caroline
4.66667,KOTH
4.57143,Radio Ronin
4.5,WAZU
4.5,Stars And Stripes
4.33333,Radio Paisano
4,Turtlehead Radio
4,Southern Relay Service
4,Satan Radio
4,YHWH
4,Radio Bingo
4,Rainin Tacos
3.57143,Radio Dr Tim
3.5,Toynbee Radio
3.5,Black Cat Radio
3.5,Radio Free ADD
3.39286,Old Time Radio
3,Laser Hot Hits
3,Chairman Of The Board Radio
3,Radio Ritalin
3,KITE SDR Radio
3,Tiger Radio
2.9,KVR
2.6,Vivian Girls Radio
2.5,Chamber Pot Radio
2,KAMP
2,Fruitcake Station
2,WRRI
2,Barn Radio
2,Pirate Pixie
1,Radio Morania
1,Radio Garbonzo
1,Progressive Radio
Avg Ratio 8.08803

Some very different results at the top of the chart! This version does not leave out stations that only had a few transmissions in 2015, such as some of the seasonal stations.

Thanks for pointing this out, Richard. And thanks for the tip about betting on number 22!

Here’s the raw data (station name, number of posts, number of threads, ratio):
Liquid Radio 872 134 6.50746
Amphetamine Radio 735 108 6.80556
XLR8 683 75 9.10667
The Crystal Ship 584 57 10.2456
Radio Free Whatever 575 47 12.234
Wolverine Radio 505 30 16.8333
Cold Country Canada 413 74 5.58108
Old Time Radio 380 112 3.39286
Ghost Shortwave 349 41 8.5122
Captain Morgan 247 38 6.5
Burn It Down Radio 203 19 10.6842
XFM 196 13 15.0769
Moonlight Radio 194 31 6.25806
PeeWee Radio 194 31 6.25806
Radio True North 184 26 7.07692
Radio Ga Ga 184 32 5.75
Insane Radio 141 17 8.29412
CKUT Relay 139 20 6.95
Channel Z 136 18 7.55556
Radio Casablanca 115 7 16.4286
Rave On Radio 111 16 6.9375
WMID 101 11 9.18182
WREC 99 12 8.25
Northwoods Radio 95 10 9.5
Boombox Radio 95 15 6.33333
Drunken DJ Radio 90 3 30
BBC Pirate Radio 85 14 6.07143
Random Radio 76 7 10.8571
Free Thinker Radio 75 6 12.5
THX1138 62 7 8.85714
X Minus One 62 7 8.85714
Undercover Radio 58 7 8.28571
Appalachia Radio 57 6 9.5
WPIG 56 8 7
KCPR 55 7 7.85714
Radio Gallifrey Intergalactic 54 5 10.8
Blue Ocean Radio 53 9 5.88889
WRR 53 6 8.83333
Toynbee Radio 49 14 3.5
Pirate Radio Boston 48 9 5.33333
Canadian Radio After Dark 48 7 6.85714
Radio Fusion Radio 48 7 6.85714
Pirate Clip Radio 43 4 10.75
Happy Hanukkah Radio 41 7 5.85714
Mushroom Radio 39 3 13
Girl Scout Radio 38 2 19
KHAT 38 5 7.6
Brockett 99 37 5 7.4
WPOD 36 2 18
Radio Broadcaster 36 5 7.2
Peskie Party Radio 35 4 8.75
Germany Calling 34 2 17
Generation Wild 100 34 2 17
CPRRS 34 6 5.66667
Radio Ronin 32 7 4.57143
Twangy Radio 32 3 10.6667
WHYP 31 5 6.2
Hard Tack Radio 31 2 15.5
Radio Halloween 31 2 15.5
WAHR 30 3 10
Solar Centric Radio 30 6 5
Renegade Radio 29 4 7.25
KVR 29 10 2.9
Up Against The Wall Radio 29 2 14.5
KIPM 28 4 7
Radio Clandestine 28 3 9.33333
WJD 28 5 5.6
KOTH 28 6 4.66667
Partial India Radio 27 5 5.4
WEAK 27 1 27
New Horizons Radio 27 2 13.5
Javelina Radio 27 4 6.75
Radio Illuminati 26 5 5.2
Radio Dr Tim 25 7 3.57143
Nordic Wind Radio 25 2 12.5
CYOT 23 3 7.66667
WLIS 22 4 5.5
Pumpkin Patch Radio 21 1 21
WEZY 21 4 5.25
Big Johnson Radio 21 3 7
Radio Trump 21 1 21
WBOG 20 3 6.66667
WOLF 20 3 6.66667
Native Radio 20 1 20
Cool AM 19 3 6.33333
WAZU 18 4 4.5
The Bangalore Poacher 17 3 5.66667
Weather Control Radio 17 3 5.66667
XEROX 16 2 8
Frederick Chopin Radio 16 2 8
W807 16 1 16
Network 51 16 3 5.33333
Radio Azteca 15 2 7.5
Radio Cinco De Mayo 15 1 15
Crazy Wave Radio 15 1 15
KAOS 14 1 14
Radio Caroline 14 3 4.66667
Sousa Station 14 1 14
Radio Paisano 13 3 4.33333
Vivian Girls Radio 13 5 2.6
Radio Free Mars Radio 12 2 6
Edmund Fitzgerald Radio 12 1 12
KBOX 12 2 6
Kid From Brooklyn 12 2 6
NRUI 11 1 11
Radio Enterhaken 11 1 11
Big Boobs Radio 10 1 10
Rcok and Roll Radio 10 1 10
WKND 9 1 9
Radio Marlene 9 1 9
COOLAM 9 1 9
D.B. Cooper Memorial 9 1 9
Stars And Stripes 9 2 4.5
Hummingbird Radio 9 1 9
Turtlehead Radio 8 2 4
Satan Radio 8 2 4
YHWH 8 2 4
WPDR 8 1 8
Ringo 8 1 8
Pirate Nation Radio 8 1 8
WGWR 7 1 7
WHJR 7 1 7
Black Cat Radio 7 2 3.5
Radio Free ADD 7 2 3.5
Channel X 7 1 7
Radio Mirror Park 7 1 7
Halloween Radio 6 1 6
Muffin Man 6 1 6
Evil Elvis Radio 6 1 6
SIRIUS XM Relay 6 1 6
Friday Night Radio 6 1 6
Chamber Pot Radio 5 2 2.5
NOEL 5 1 5
Hobart Radio 5 1 5
Christmas Radio 5 1 5
Southern Relay Service 4 1 4
KAMP 4 2 2
Fruitcake Station 4 2 2
Radio Bingo 4 1 4
Rainin Tacos 4 1 4
Laser Hot Hits 3 1 3
Chairman Of The Board Radio 3 1 3
Radio Ritalin 3 1 3
KITE SDR Radio 3 1 3
Tiger Radio 3 1 3
WRRI 2 1 2
Barn Radio 2 1 2
Pirate Pixie 2 1 2
Radio Morania 1 1 1
Radio Garbonzo 1 1 1
Progressive Radio 1 1 1

One risk here is that the same transmission could be logged in two, or even more, threads, which would reduce this ratio.

To gauge shortwave pirate radio activity in 2015, I analyzed the loggings to the HF Underground (http://www.hfunderground.com) message board. A computer script parsed the message thread titles, as well as the timestamps of the messages. This information was used to produce some statistics about the level of pirate radio activity. Of course, as Mark Twain has written: “There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.” Still, let’s see what we can learn.

There were 13,944 messages posted to 2,183 unique threads, that’s a 10% increase in the number of messages over 2014. Ideally, each thread represents an individual pirate station transmission. Also ideally, each message posted to a thread represents one logging. In reality, there is some error involved.

First, we can look at the transmission mode used:
AM 996
USB 954
LSB 39
CW 17
FM 11
SSTV 57
UNKNOWN 109
sum: 2183

AM barely beat out USB this year, last year there were 944 AM transmissions vs 776 USB. If we assume (as likely) that the cases where no mode was reported were one of these, AM and USB account for virtually all of the transmissions. Cold Country Canada is the major user of LSB, along with Peskie Party Radio.

SSTV was broken out just to show about how many SSTV transmissions there are, these of course are almost all transmitted in USB mode. Also, these are cases where SSTV is in the logging title, which means that the transmission was probably just SSTV, vs a station that also happened to transmit SSTV as part of the program, such as Wolverine Radio commonly does.

Next, we can see how much activity there is for each day of the week:

Sunday 449 (21%)
Monday 167 (8%)
Tuesday 172 (8%)
Wednesday 187 (9%)
Thursday 249 (11%)
Friday 366 (17%)
Saturday 593 (27%)

As one might expect, Saturday and Sunday are the big winners, with Friday in third place. But don’t give up on weekday listening! Over a third of all transmissions are on a Monday through Thursday.

We can also look at the number of logging threads per month, to gauge activity:

After a relatively flat trend during the first half of the year, activity really took off during the second half.

Here’s a graph showing the number of broadcasts per day of the year that were logged, please click on the image to see it full sized:

Holidays are, as usual, a great opportunity to hear pirate stations.

We might be interested in knowing the best time of the day to try for a station. Here’s a plot of the start times of the logged broadcasts, binned
by UTC hour of the day:

As you might expect, evening Eastern Time is the best, roughly 2300-0200 UTC, with a broader peak of lower activity from roughly 2000-0500 UTC. There is some activity in the morning to afternoon time period, and very little during the wee hours.

The next question is where to tune. As one might expect, 6925 kHz was the clear winner:

3440 kHz: 8
6150 kHz: 14
6770 kHz: 110
6850 kHz: 30
6873 kHz: 23
6874 kHz: 9
6875 kHz: 15
6876 kHz: 33
6880 kHz: 8
6900 kHz: 6
6919 kHz: 7
6920 kHz: 9
6922 kHz: 4
6923 kHz: 8
6924 kHz: 78
6925 kHz: 782
6926 kHz: 16
6927 kHz: 6
6928 kHz: 5
6929 kHz: 13
6930 kHz: 109
6932 kHz: 12
6933 kHz: 5
6934 kHz: 9
6935 kHz: 76
6939 kHz: 10
6940 kHz: 38
6945 kHz: 23
6948 kHz: 4
6949 kHz: 21
6950 kHz: 274
6951 kHz: 14
6952 kHz: 10
6954 kHz: 9
6955 kHz: 121
6956 kHz: 7
6960 kHz: 23
6962 kHz: 12
6964 kHz: 6
6965 kHz: 18
6969 kHz: 75
6970 kHz: 4
6974 kHz: 4
6975 kHz: 9
7540 kHz: 4
7590 kHz: 7

6925, along with 6924 and 6926 kHz, account for about 40% of logged transmissions. Last year they accounted for 50%, so there has been some movement to other frequencies. Also worth considering is that Old Time Radio’s use of 6770 kHz accounts for about 9% of the broadcast threads.

Just a few weeks ago, 3440 kHz started to get some use, due to 43 meters “going long” and being unusable for short distance reception at night. Whether or not this trend will continue remains to be seen. It’s a great frequency for nighttime use, but not as many listeners check it out, or have decent antennas for 90 meters.

The most popular station logged is of course “UNID”, short for unidentified. In the world of shortwave pirate radio, there’s a number of transmissions where no ID is given. There’s also cases where no ID could be heard, due to poor conditions. This year, 801 out of 2,183 threads were UNID, or about 37 percent. For 2014, there were 651 threads with 2,788 loggings where no station ID was given – that’s almost 33 percent of the threads.

Here’s the complete list of all stations with two or more logging threads:
UNID (801)
Liquid Radio (134)
Old Time Radio (112)
Amphetamine Radio (108)
XLR8 (75)
Cold Country Canada (74)
The Crystal Ship (57)
Radio Free Whatever (47)
Ghost Shortwave (41)
Captain Morgan (38)
Radio Ga Ga (32)
Moonlight Radio (31)
PeeWee Radio (31)
Wolverine Radio (30)
Radio True North (26)
CKUT Relay (20)
Burn It Down Radio (19)
Channel Z (18)
Insane Radio (17)
Rave On Radio (16)
Boombox Radio (15)
Toynbee Radio (14)
BBC Pirate Radio (14)
XFM (13)
WREC (12)
WMID (11)
Northwoods Radio (10)
KVR (10)
Blue Ocean Radio (9)
Pirate Radio Boston (9)
WPIG (8)
Radio Ronin (7)
Undercover Radio (7)
Radio Casablanca (7)
Random Radio (7)
Happy Hanukkah Radio (7)
Radio Dr Tim (7)
KCPR (7)
Canadian Radio After Dark (7)
Radio Fusion Radio (7)
THX1138 (7)
X Minus One (7)
Appalachia Radio (6)
WRR (6)
Free Thinker Radio (6)
Solar Centric Radio (6)
CPRRS (6)
KOTH (6)
WHYP (5)
Radio Gallifrey Intergalactic (5)
Partial India Radio (5)
Vivian Girls Radio (5)
WJD (5)
Radio Illuminati (5)
Brockett 99 (5)
Radio Broadcaster (5)
KHAT (5)
KIPM (4)
WAZU (4)
Renegade Radio (4)
WLIS (4)
Peskie Party Radio (4)
WEZY (4)
Javelina Radio (4)
Pirate Clip Radio (4)
CYOT (3)
WBOG (3)
Cool AM (3)
Mushroom Radio (3)
Radio Clandestine (3)
Radio Paisano (3)
WOLF (3)
Twangy Radio (3)
WAHR (3)
Drunken DJ Radio (3)
The Bangalore Poacher (3)
Weather Control Radio (3)
Radio Caroline (3)
Network 51 (3)
Big Johnson Radio (3)
WPOD (2)
Chamber Pot Radio (2)
Turtlehead Radio (2)
Radio Free Mars Radio (2)
Hard Tack Radio (2)
Germany Calling (2)
Radio Azteca (2)
XEROX (2)
Frederick Chopin Radio (2)
Black Cat Radio (2)
KAMP (2)
Fruitcake Station (2)
Satan Radio (2)
Radio Halloween (2)
YHWH (2)
KBOX (2)
Generation Wild 100 (2)
Radio Free ADD (2)
Girl Scout Radio (2)
New Horizons Radio (2)
Nordic Wind Radio (2)
Stars And Stripes (2)
Up Against The Wall Radio (2)
Kid From Brooklyn (2)

Another thing we can look at are the total number of posts in all logging threads for each station, as a rough guide to how many listeners heard a particular station. There’s duplication of course, as the same listener likely reported several broadcasts for each station:
Liquid Radio (872)
Amphetamine Radio (735)
XLR8 (683)
The Crystal Ship (584)
Radio Free Whatever (575)
Wolverine Radio (505)
Cold Country Canada (413)
Old Time Radio (380)
Ghost Shortwave (349)
Captain Morgan (247)
Burn It Down Radio (203)
XFM (196)
Moonlight Radio (194)
PeeWee Radio (194)
Radio True North (184)
Radio Ga Ga (184)
Insane Radio (141)
CKUT Relay (139)
Channel Z (136)
Radio Casablanca (115)
Rave On Radio (111)
WMID (101)
WREC (99)
Northwoods Radio (95)
Boombox Radio (95)
Drunken DJ Radio (90)
BBC Pirate Radio (85)
Random Radio (76)
Free Thinker Radio (75)
THX1138 (62)
X Minus One (62)
Undercover Radio (58)
Appalachia Radio (57)
WPIG (56)
KCPR (55)
Radio Gallifrey Intergalactic (54)
Blue Ocean Radio (53)
WRR (53)
Toynbee Radio (49)
Pirate Radio Boston (48)
Canadian Radio After Dark (48)
Radio Fusion Radio (48)
Pirate Clip Radio (43)
Happy Hanukkah Radio (41)
Mushroom Radio (39)
Girl Scout Radio (38)
KHAT (38)
Brockett 99 (37)
WPOD (36)
Radio Broadcaster (36)
Peskie Party Radio (35)
Germany Calling (34)
Generation Wild 100 (34)
CPRRS (34)
Radio Ronin (32)
Twangy Radio (32)
WHYP (31)
Hard Tack Radio (31)
Radio Halloween (31)
WAHR (30)
Solar Centric Radio (30)
Renegade Radio (29)
KVR (29)
Up Against The Wall Radio (29)
KIPM (28)
Radio Clandestine (28)
WJD (28)
KOTH (28)
Partial India Radio (27)
New Horizons Radio (27)
Javelina Radio (27)
Radio Illuminati (26)
Radio Dr Tim (25)
Nordic Wind Radio (25)
CYOT (23)
WLIS (22)
WEZY (21)
Big Johnson Radio (21)
WBOG (20)
WOLF (20)
Cool AM (19)
WAZU (18)
The Bangalore Poacher (17)
Weather Control Radio (17)
XEROX (16)
Frederick Chopin Radio (16)
Network 51 (16)
Radio Azteca (15)
Radio Caroline (14)
Radio Paisano (13)
Vivian Girls Radio (13)
Radio Free Mars Radio (12)
KBOX (12)
Kid From Brooklyn (12)
Stars And Stripes (9)
Turtlehead Radio (8)
Satan Radio (8)
YHWH (8)
Black Cat Radio (7)
Radio Free ADD (7)
Chamber Pot Radio (5)
KAMP (4)
Fruitcake Station (4)

Next we can calculate the ratio of logging messages per thread, to gauge, in general, how many people reported hearing each station:
Liquid Radio 872 134 6.50746
Amphetamine Radio 735 108 6.80556
XLR8 683 75 9.10667
The Crystal Ship 584 57 10.2456
Radio Free Whatever 575 47 12.234
Wolverine Radio 505 30 16.8333
Cold Country Canada 413 74 5.58108
Old Time Radio 380 112 3.39286
Ghost Shortwave 349 41 8.5122
Captain Morgan 247 38 6.5
Burn It Down Radio 203 19 10.6842
XFM 196 13 15.0769
Moonlight Radio 194 31 6.25806
PeeWee Radio 194 31 6.25806
Radio True North 184 26 7.07692
Radio Ga Ga 184 32 5.75
Insane Radio 141 17 8.29412
CKUT Relay 139 20 6.95
Channel Z 136 18 7.55556
Rave On Radio 111 16 6.9375
WMID 101 11 9.18182
WREC 99 12 8.25
Boombox Radio 95 15 6.33333
BBC Pirate Radio 85 14 6.07143
Toynbee Radio 49 14 3.5

For each station, the first number is the total number of reports, the second is the number of threads, the third is the ratio. One risk here is that the same transmission could be logged in two, or even more, threads, which would reduce this ratio.

We can then sort these by ratio:
16.8333,Wolverine Radio
15.0769,XFM
12.234,Radio Free Whatever
10.6842,Burn It Down Radio
10.2456,The Crystal Ship
9.18182,WMID
9.10667,XLR8
8.5122,Ghost Shortwave
8.29412,Insane Radio
8.25,WREC
7.55556,Channel Z
7.07692,Radio True North
6.95,CKUT Relay
6.9375,Rave On Radio
6.80556,Amphetamine Radio
6.50746,Liquid Radio
6.5,Captain Morgan
6.33333,Boombox Radio
6.25806,Moonlight Radio
6.25806,PeeWee Radio
6.07143,BBC Pirate Radio
5.75,Radio Ga Ga
5.58108,Cold Country Canada
3.5,Toynbee Radio
3.39286,Old Time Radio

Avg Ratio 7.99587

Note: The above table only includes stations with 11 or more logging threads. I have posted an addendum that includes all stations, even down to those with just one thread.

This year’s results are somewhat less straightforward, due to a station nicknamed “Old Time Radio”. It has transmitted almost 24/7 (with some breaks for a few days) since around April, usually on 6770 kHz. Sometimes the same logging thread was used for several days worth of loggings. How many transmissions has it made? Sometimes it has been on for weeks at a time. Certainly in terms of the number of hours transmitted, it is the most active pirate radio station by far for 2015, as it was in 2014. No other station comes close.

To gauge shortwave pirate radio activity in 2014, I analyzed the loggings to the HF Underground (http://www.hfunderground.com) message board. A computer script parsed the message thread titles, as well as the timestamps of the messages. This information was used to produce some statistics about the level of pirate radio activity. Of course, as Mark Twain has written: “There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.” Still, let’s see what we can learn.

There were 12,722 messages posted to 1,975 unique threads, that’s an 11% decrease in the number of messages over 2013. Ideally, each thread represents an individual pirate station transmission. Also ideally, each message posted to a thread represents one logging. In reality, there is some error involved.

First, we can look at the transmission mode used:
AM 944
USB 776
LSB 49
CW 32
FM 16
SSTV 46
UNKNOWN 112

AM beat out USB this year, last year they were virtually tied, and if we assume (as likely) that the cases where no mode was reported are one of these, account for virtually all of the transmission.

SSTV was broken out just to show about how many SSTV transmissions there are, these of course are almost all transmitted in USB mode. Also, these are cases where SSTV is in the logging title, which means that the transmission was probably just SSTV, vs a station that also happened to transmit SSTV as part of the program.

Next, we can see how much activity there is for each day of the week:

Sunday 387 (20%)
Monday 155 (8%)
Tuesday 189 (10%)
Wednesday 223 (11%)
Thursday 230 (12%)
Friday 331 (17%)
Saturday 460 (23%)

As one might expect, Saturday and Sunday are the big winners, with Friday in third place. But don’t give up on weekday listening! 40% of transmissions are on a Monday through Thursday.

We can also look at the number of logging threads per month, to gauge activity:

Here’s a graph showing the number of broadcasts per day of the year that were logged:

Halloween was very busy this year!

We might be interested in knowing the best time of the day to try for a station. Here’s a plot of the start times of the logged broadcasts, binned
by UTC hour of the day:

As you might expect, evening Eastern Time is the best, roughly 2300-0300 UTC, with a broader peak of lower activity from roughly 2000-0500 UTC. There is some activity in the morning to afternoon time period, and very little during the wee hours.

The next question is where to tune. As one might expect, 6925 kHz was the clear winner:

3229 kHz: 18
3395 kHz: 4
6150 kHz: 7
6280 kHz: 9
6769 kHz: 5
6770 kHz: 50
6771 kHz: 6
6772 kHz: 9
6849 kHz: 4
6850 kHz: 10
6867 kHz: 5
6873 kHz: 10
6875 kHz: 19
6876 kHz: 16
6880 kHz: 26
6885 kHz: 4
6900 kHz: 7
6910 kHz: 6
6913 kHz: 6
6915 kHz: 6
6919 kHz: 16
6920 kHz: 21
6924 kHz: 102
6925 kHz: 885
6926 kHz: 6
6927 kHz: 5
6928 kHz: 6
6929 kHz: 11
6930 kHz: 117
6931 kHz: 4
6932 kHz: 4
6933 kHz: 4
6935 kHz: 103
6940 kHz: 62
6945 kHz: 31
6948 kHz: 7
6949 kHz: 27
6950 kHz: 103
6951 kHz: 10
6955 kHz: 12
6960 kHz: 10
6965 kHz: 5
6969 kHz: 4
6970 kHz: 5
6974 kHz: 6
6975 kHz: 7
9600 kHz: 9
9605 kHz: 14
9610 kHz: 4
11595 kHz: 11
15655 kHz: 15
15695 kHz: 4

6925, along with 6924 kHz, account for 50% of logged transmissions.

The most popular station logged is of course “UNID”, short for unidentified. In the world of shortwave pirate radio, there’s a number of transmissions where no ID is given. There’s also many cases where no ID could be heard, due to poor conditions. For 2014, there were 651 threads with 2,788 loggings where no station ID was given – that’s almost 33% of the threads.

Here’s the complete list of all stations with two or more logging threads:
UNID (651)
Radio Free Whatever (112)
YHWH (106)
Old Time Radio (87)
XLR8 (70)
Radio Ga Ga (45)
Undercover Radio (37)
WRR (34)
Captain Morgan (33)
Wolverine Radio (30)
The Crystal Ship (29)
Radio True North (27)
Blue Ocean Radio (26)
Liquid Radio (25)
Cool AM (24)
Channel Z (21)
KCPR (21)
Red Mercury Labs (19)
PPVR (18)
WHYP (17)
Pirate Radio Boston (16)
The Bangalore Poacher (16)
Rave On Radio (15)
MAC Shortwave (15)
Orbital Mind Control Satellite (14)
XFM (13)
Happy Hanukkah Radio (13)
Turtlehead Radio (12)
Man Cave Radio (12)
Radio Gallifrey Intergalactic (12)
Renegade Radio (11)
Make Your Liver Quiver Radio (11)
Northwoods Radio (10)
Rattlesnake Radio (10)
Generation Wild 100 (10)
Radio Ronin (9)
Insane Radio (8)
Boombox Radio (8)
WRMR (8)
CYOT (7)
Toynbee Radio (7)
COOLAM (7)
Big Dawg Radio (7)
Twangy Radio (6)
Son of the Lincolnshire Poacher (6)
WPOD (5)
Appalachia Radio (5)
Metro Radio International (5)
WAHR (5)
Vo Mongolia (5)
WMID (5)
Chairman Of The Board Radio (5)
Aggressive Policeman Station (5)
Hit Parade Radio (4)
Radio Dr Tim (4)
Looking At You Radio (4)
Peskie Party Radio (4)
L0DE Radio Hour (4)
The yodeler (4)
Free Thinker Radio (4)
Radio Jingle Bells (4)
KMUD (3)
WBNY (3)
Random Radio (3)
BZN (3)
PBS Underground (3)
Radio Paisano (3)
WJFK (3)
Radio Halloween (3)
KIKI Radio (3)
Radio Plate Current (3)
Drifting Crystal Radio (3)
Artem Radio (3)
Don’t Panic / Sirens / Ebola (3)
KIPM (2)
Chamber Pot Radio (2)
Northern Relay Service (2)
Radio Bleh Bleh (2)
Hot Legs Radio (2)
Hard Tack Radio (2)
Radio Casablanca (2)
Mushroom Radio (2)
Germany Calling (2)
Radio Azteca (2)
XEROX (2)
Pseudo Radio (2)
Hot Radio (2)
WHJR (2)
Mysterious Mystic Radio (2)
Left Lane Radio (2)
Radio Marlene (2)
Voice of Honor (2)
Pumpkin Patch Radio (2)
Satan Radio (2)
Turkey Breast Radio (2)
Drunken DJ Radio (2)
Radio Jihad (2)
Indira Calling (2)
WPDR (2)
Blues Traveler (2)
WMFQ (2)
Radio Music Bed (2)
Radio Underground (2)
The Great Pumpkin (2)
Lord Hee Haw (2)
London Calling (2)
Radio Free ADD (2)

Another thing we can look at are the number of posts in a logging thread for each station. Note that there is the likelihood of some duplicate posts by the same user for each thread, so these figures may be slightly inflated:
Radio Free Whatever (935)
XLR8 (558)
Wolverine Radio (529)
YHWH (511)
Captain Morgan (398)
Undercover Radio (372)
Radio Ga Ga (322)
The Crystal Ship (320)
WRR (312)
Old Time Radio (301)
XFM (220)
MAC Shortwave (177)
Channel Z (174)
Liquid Radio (173)
Blue Ocean Radio (159)
Radio True North (157)
Cool AM (147)
WHYP (146)
Pirate Radio Boston (133)
Radio Ronin (129)
Renegade Radio (129)
Generation Wild 100 (128)
KCPR (121)
Orbital Mind Control Satellite (121)
Northwoods Radio (116)
Rave On Radio (108)
Red Mercury Labs (104)
The Bangalore Poacher (94)
Man Cave Radio (85)
PPVR (74)
Radio Gallifrey Intergalactic (73)
Insane Radio (72)
CYOT (70)
Drunken DJ Radio (70)
WMID (68)
Happy Hanukkah Radio (67)
Twangy Radio (66)
Turtlehead Radio (62)
Big Dawg Radio (57)
Radio Jingle Bells (56)
Boombox Radio (52)
Make Your Liver Quiver Radio (52)
Vo Mongolia (49)
Chairman Of The Board Radio (49)
Peskie Party Radio (49)
Metro Radio International (46)
COOLAM (43)
Radio Marlene (41)
Radio Dr Tim (38)
WPOD (37)
Hit Parade Radio (33)
Son of the Lincolnshire Poacher (33)
Free Thinker Radio (32)
Toynbee Radio (31)
Rattlesnake Radio (30)
Indira Calling (29)
WRMR (28)
L0DE Radio Hour (28)
BZN (25)
PBS Underground (25)
Radio Paisano (25)
Pumpkin Patch Radio (25)
Radio Casablanca (24)
WAHR (22)
Drifting Crystal Radio (22)
Radio Music Bed (22)
Artem Radio (22)
Northern Relay Service (20)
Radio Bleh Bleh (20)
Radio Plate Current (20)
Don’t Panic / Sirens / Ebola (20)
XEROX (19)
KMUD (18)
Random Radio (18)
WJFK (18)
WHJR (17)
Radio Underground (17)
Appalachia Radio (16)
The Great Pumpkin (16)
Radio Free ADD (16)
Pseudo Radio (15)
Turkey Breast Radio (14)
Aggressive Policeman Station (14)
Hard Tack Radio (13)
Radio Halloween (13)
The yodeler (13)
London Calling (13)
Mysterious Mystic Radio (12)
Germany Calling (11)
Left Lane Radio (11)
Satan Radio (11)
Radio Jihad (11)
Looking At You Radio (10)
KIKI Radio (9)
Mushroom Radio (8)
Lord Hee Haw (8)
Hot Legs Radio (7)
Hot Radio (7)
WBNY (6)
Radio Azteca (6)
WPDR (6)
Blues Traveler (5)
WMFQ (5)
Chamber Pot Radio (4)
KIPM (3)
Voice of Honor (3)

Next we can calculate the ratio of logging messages per thread, to gauge, in general, how many people reported hearing each station:
Radio Free Whatever 935 112 8.34821
XLR8 558 70 7.97143
Wolverine Radio 529 30 17.6333
YHWH 511 106 4.82075
Captain Morgan 398 33 12.0606
Undercover Radio 372 37 10.0541
Radio Ga Ga 322 45 7.15556
The Crystal Ship 320 29 11.0345
WRR 312 34 9.17647
Old Time Radio 301 87 3.45977
XFM 220 13 16.9231
MAC Shortwave 177 15 11.8
Channel Z 174 21 8.28571
Liquid Radio 173 25 6.92
Blue Ocean Radio 159 26 6.11538
Radio True North 157 27 5.81482
Cool AM 147 24 6.125
WHYP 146 17 8.58823
Pirate Radio Boston 133 16 8.3125
Renegade Radio 129 11 11.7273
KCPR 121 21 5.7619
Orbital Mind Control Satellite 121 14 8.64286
Rave On Radio 108 15 7.2
Red Mercury Labs 104 19 5.47368
The Bangalore Poacher 94 16 5.875
Man Cave Radio 85 12 7.08333
PPVR 74 18 4.11111
Radio Gallifrey Intergalactic 73 12 6.08333
Happy Hanukkah Radio 67 13 5.15385
Turtlehead Radio 62 12 5.16667
Make Your Liver Quiver Radio 52 11 4.72727

One risk here is that the same transmission could be logged in two, or even more, threads, which would reduce this ratio,

We can then sort these by ratio:
17.6333,Wolverine Radio
16.9231,XFM
12.0606,Captain Morgan
11.8,MAC Shortwave
11.7273,Renegade Radio
11.0345,The Crystal Ship
10.0541,Undercover Radio
9.17647,WRR
8.64286,Orbital Mind Control Satellite
8.58823,WHYP
8.34821,Radio Free Whatever
8.3125,Pirate Radio Boston
8.28571,Channel Z
7.97143,XLR8
7.2,Rave On Radio
7.15556,Radio Ga Ga
7.08333,Man Cave Radio
6.92,Liquid Radio
6.125,Cool AM
6.11538,Blue Ocean Radio
6.08333,Radio Gallifrey Intergalactic
5.875,The Bangalore Poacher
5.81482,Radio True North
5.7619,KCPR
5.47368,Red Mercury Labs
5.16667,Turtlehead Radio
5.15385,Happy Hanukkah Radio
4.82075,YHWH
4.72727,Make Your Liver Quiver Radio
4.11111,PPVR
3.45977,Old Time Radio

Avg Ratio 7.98728

This year’s results are somewhat less straightforward, due to a station nicknamed “Old Time Radio”. It has transmitted almost 24/7 (with some breaks for a few days) since around April, usually on 6770 kHz, but also sometimes around 3229 kHz. Sometimes the same logging thread was used for several days worth of loggings. How many transmissions has it made? Sometimes it has been on for weeks at a time. Certainly in terms of the number of hours transmitted, it is the most active pirate radio station by far for 2014. No other station comes close.

Yes, I’m about 11 months late in getting this out… but better late than never! Your comments are certainly appreciated, as well as suggestions for additional data you’d like to see for 2014.

To gauge shortwave pirate radio activity in 2013, I analyzed the loggings to the HF Underground (http://www.hfunderground.com) message board. A computer script parsed the message thread titles, as well as the timestamps of the messages. This information was used to produce some statistics about the level of pirate radio activity. Of course, as Mark Twain has written: “There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.” Still, let’s see what we can learn.

There were 14,287 messages posted to 2,461 unique threads, that’s a 64% increase in the number of messages over 2012. Ideally, each thread represents an individual pirate station transmission. Also ideally, each message posted to a thread represents one logging. In reality, there is some error involved.

First, we can look at the transmission mode used:
AM 1077
USB 1091
LSB 26
CW 48
FM 18
SSTV 42
UNKNOWN 159

AM and USB are virtually tied, and if we assume (as likely) that the cases where no mode was reported are one of these, account for virtually all of the transmission.

SSTV was broken out just to show about how many SSTV transmissions there are, these of course are almost all transmitted in USB mode. Also, these are cases where SSTV is in the logging title, which means that the transmission was probably just SSTV, vs a station that also happened to transmit SSTV as part of the program.

Next, we can see how much activity there is for each day of the week:

Sunday 533 22%
Monday 226 9%
Tuesday 257 10%
Wednesday 228 9%
Thursday 269 11%
Friday 376 15%
Saturday 572 23%

As one might expect, Saturday and Sunday are the big winners, with Friday in third place. But don’t give up on weekday listening! 39% of transmissions are on a Monday through Thursday.

We can also look at the number of logging threads per month, to gauge activity:

Since the overall popularity of the HF Underground continues to grow, there is possibly some inflation in the number of threads as the year goes on.

Here’s a graph showing the number of broadcasts per day of the year that were logged:

We might be interested in knowing the best time of the day to try for a station. Here’s a plot of the start times of the logged broadcasts, binned
by UTC hour of the day:

As you might expect, evening Eastern Time is the best, roughly 2300-0300 UTC, with a broader peak of lower activity from roughly 2000-0500 UTC. There is some activity in the morning to afternoon time period, and very little during the wee hours.

The next question is where to tune. As one might expect, 6925 kHz was the clear winner:

6850 kHz: 14
6900 kHz: 7
6919 kHz: 6
6920 kHz: 41
6921 kHz: 17
6923 kHz: 5
6924 kHz: 116
6925 kHz: 1360
6926 kHz: 5
6929 kHz: 15
6930 kHz: 147
6931 kHz: 12
6933 kHz: 6
6935 kHz: 143
6936 kHz: 4
6937 kHz: 8
6938 kHz: 7
6940 kHz: 92
6945 kHz: 58
6949 kHz: 24
6950 kHz: 170
6951 kHz: 13
6955 kHz: 34
6960 kHz: 7
6965 kHz: 5
6966 kHz: 7
6970 kHz: 6
6974 kHz: 5
6975 kHz: 27
13875 kHz: 7

6925, along with 6924 and 6926 kHz, account for 60% of logged transmissions.

The most popular station logged is of course “UNID”, short for unidentified. In the world of shortwave pirate radio, there’s a number of transmissions where no ID is given. There’s also many cases where no ID could be heard, due to poor conditions. For 2013, there were 677 threads with 2,554 loggings where no station ID was given – that’s almost 28% of the threads.

Here’s the complete list of all stations with two or more logging threads:
UNID (677)
Red Mercury Labs (128)
Radio Free Whatever (98)
Blue Ocean Radio (87)
Radio Ga Ga (65)
Rave On Radio (63)
Boombox Radio (63)
PeePee Vagina (56)
Radio True North (52)
Wolverine Radio (43)
Pirate Radio Boston (43)
Radio TOTSE (39)
Radio Echo One (37)
Radio Ronin (33)
Captain Morgan (32)
Undercover Radio (31)
The Crystal Ship (30)
Radio Gallifrey Intergalactic (26)
XLR8 (25)
Twangy Radio (22)
Metro Radio International (20)
WGWR (20)
XFM (19)
Pseudo Radio (19)
Renegade Radio (18)
WBNY (17)
Liquid Radio (16)
Turtlehead Radio (15)
Mysterious Mystic Radio (15)
Channel Z (13)
Radio Jamba International (13)
MAC Shortwave (13)
Northwoods Radio (12)
Black Cat Radio (12)
Happy Hanukkah Radio (12)
Toynbee Radio (11)
Chamber Pot Radio (11)
Hit Parade Radio (11)
The Late Movie (11)
BOCHF (10)
WMPR (9)
WFMT (9)
Insane Radio (9)
Man Cave Radio (9)
Partial India Radio (9)
PBS Underground (9)
CYOT (8)
WPOD (8)
Radio Azteca (8)
All Aboard Radio (8)
My New Underpants (8)
The Big Q (8)
Cool AM (7)
WFUQ (7)
Rattlesnake Radio (7)
WJFK (7)
All Along The Watchtower Radio (6)
Appalachia Radio (6)
XEROX (6)
Hot Radio (6)
Rebel Radio (6)
Left Lane Radio (6)
Hard Tack Radio (5)
Grizzly Bear Radio (5)
Pirates Week Relay (5)
Vo Pancho Villa (5)
KAMP (5)
Voice of Bacon (5)
Tea Party Radio (5)
LTO Radio (5)
WAZU (4)
EAM Guy (4)
Radio Casablanca (4)
Radio Therapy (4)
SDF1 (4)
CHKN (4)
Sharon Radio (4)
Edmund Fitzgerald Radio (4)
Fruitcake Station (4)
Radio Dr Tim (4)
KAOS (3)
KIPM (3)
WPON (3)
Eccentric Shortwave (3)
Big Boobs Radio (3)
Hot Legs Radio (3)
Mushroom Radio (3)
XENU (3)
WUBR (3)
Radio Marlene (3)
Radio Paisano (3)
Voice of Honor (3)
NOEL (3)
WCS (3)
Radio Free Speech (3)
WAHR (3)
Witch City Radio (3)
The Edge (3)
KPZL (2)
Ann Hoffer Live (2)
Radio Strange Outpost 7 (2)
Radio Morania (2)
Radio First Termer (2)
Radio Whatever (2)
BZN (2)
Vo American Indian (2)
Hello Radio (2)
PPVR (2)
Radio Cinco De Mayo (2)
Radio Snausages (2)
Mouth of Mohammed (2)
WFUZ (2)
Kennedy Assassination News (2)
Voice of the Robots (2)
YHWH (2)
Turkey Breast Radio (2)
WSBR (2)
Radio Jihad (2)
Victory Radio (2)

Another thing we can look at are the number of posts in a logging thread for each station. Note that there is the likelihood of some duplicate posts by the same user for each thread, so these figures may be slightly inflated:
Red Mercury Labs (945)
Radio Free Whatever (740)
Wolverine Radio (559)
Blue Ocean Radio (427)
Rave On Radio (377)
Boombox Radio (335)
Radio Ga Ga (334)
Radio True North (318)
The Crystal Ship (308)
PeePee Vagina (268)
Radio Echo One (253)
Undercover Radio (237)
Radio TOTSE (234)
Radio Ronin (222)
Pirate Radio Boston (222)
Captain Morgan (213)
Radio Gallifrey Intergalactic (207)
Twangy Radio (206)
Renegade Radio (196)
XLR8 (188)
MAC Shortwave (150)
XFM (149)
Metro Radio International (142)
Black Cat Radio (129)
Radio Jamba International (115)
Liquid Radio (106)
Partial India Radio (103)
WGWR (99)
Northwoods Radio (91)
PBS Underground (90)
WBNY (89)
Channel Z (83)
The Late Movie (82)
Mysterious Mystic Radio (81)
Pseudo Radio (78)
Insane Radio (75)
WMPR (71)
BOCHF (71)
WFMT (59)
Turtlehead Radio (59)
WPOD (57)
Hit Parade Radio (57)
Appalachia Radio (56)
Toynbee Radio (55)
Radio Marlene (55)
Man Cave Radio (54)
Happy Hanukkah Radio (53)
CYOT (51)
Hard Tack Radio (51)
Cool AM (50)
WJFK (48)
LTO Radio (47)
Chamber Pot Radio (46)
Grizzly Bear Radio (43)
EAM Guy (40)
Edmund Fitzgerald Radio (36)
WFUQ (35)
Voice of Bacon (34)
All Aboard Radio (33)
My New Underpants (33)
Radio Azteca (32)
Left Lane Radio (32)
XEROX (31)
Mouth of Mohammed (31)
KIPM (30)
All Along The Watchtower Radio (30)
Radio Casablanca (29)
KAMP (29)
KAOS (27)
The Big Q (27)
Witch City Radio (27)
SDF1 (26)
Sharon Radio (26)
Rattlesnake Radio (25)
WPON (24)
Hot Legs Radio (24)
Radio Paisano (24)
WAZU (23)
Mushroom Radio (23)
CHKN (23)
Voice of Honor (23)
Big Boobs Radio (21)
Vo Pancho Villa (21)
Radio Cinco De Mayo (21)
Fruitcake Station (21)
Voice of the Robots (20)
Radio First Termer (19)
Hot Radio (19)
WSBR (19)
Eccentric Shortwave (17)
NOEL (17)
WAHR (17)
Radio Snausages (16)
Rebel Radio (15)
Tea Party Radio (15)
KPZL (14)
Radio Morania (14)
Pirates Week Relay (14)
XENU (13)
BZN (12)
YHWH (12)
Radio Dr Tim (11)
Radio Free Speech (11)
Ann Hoffer Live (10)
PPVR (10)
Kennedy Assassination News (10)
WCS (10)
Turkey Breast Radio (10)
Radio Jihad (10)
Victory Radio (10)
Radio Therapy (9)
WFUZ (9)
Radio Whatever (8)
WUBR (8)
Vo American Indian (7)
Hello Radio (6)
The Edge (6)
Radio Strange Outpost 7 (2)

Next we can calculate the ratio of logging messages per thread, to gauge, in general, how many people reported hearing each station:
Red Mercury Labs 945 128 7.38281
Radio Free Whatever 740 98 7.55102
Wolverine Radio 559 43 13
Blue Ocean Radio 427 87 4.90805
Rave On Radio 377 63 5.98413
Boombox Radio 335 63 5.31746
Radio Ga Ga 334 65 5.13846
Radio True North 318 52 6.11538
The Crystal Ship 308 30 10.2667
PeePee Vagina 268 56 4.78571
Radio Echo One 253 37 6.83784
Undercover Radio 237 31 7.64516
Radio TOTSE 234 39 6
Radio Ronin 222 33 6.72727
Pirate Radio Boston 222 43 5.16279
Captain Morgan 213 32 6.65625
Radio Gallifrey Intergalactic 207 26 7.96154
Twangy Radio 206 22 9.36364
Renegade Radio 196 18 10.8889
XLR8 188 25 7.52
MAC Shortwave 150 13 11.5385
XFM 149 19 7.84211
Metro Radio International 142 20 7.1
Black Cat Radio 129 12 10.75
Radio Jamba International 115 13 8.84615
Liquid Radio 106 16 6.625
WGWR 99 20 4.95
Northwoods Radio 91 12 7.58333
WBNY 89 17 5.23529
Channel Z 83 13 6.38462
The Late Movie 82 11 7.45455
Mysterious Mystic Radio 81 15 5.4
Pseudo Radio 78 19 4.10526
Turtlehead Radio 59 15 3.93333
Hit Parade Radio 57 11 5.18182
Toynbee Radio 55 11 5
Happy Hanukkah Radio 53 12 4.41667
Chamber Pot Radio 46 11 4.18182

One risk here is that the same transmission could be logged in two, or even more, threads, which would reduce this ratio,

We can then sort these by ratio:
13,Wolverine Radio
11.5385,MAC Shortwave
10.8889,Renegade Radio
10.75,Black Cat Radio
10.2667,The Crystal Ship
9.36364,Twangy Radio
8.84615,Radio Jamba International
7.96154,Radio Gallifrey Intergalactic
7.84211,XFM
7.64516,Undercover Radio
7.58333,Northwoods Radio
7.55102,Radio Free Whatever
7.52,XLR8
7.45455,The Late Movie
7.38281,Red Mercury Labs
7.1,Metro Radio International
6.83784,Radio Echo One
6.72727,Radio Ronin
6.65625,Captain Morgan
6.625,Liquid Radio
6.38462,Channel Z
6.11538,Radio True North
6,Radio TOTSE
5.98413,Rave On Radio
5.4,Mysterious Mystic Radio
5.31746,Boombox Radio
5.23529,WBNY
5.18182,Hit Parade Radio
5.16279,Pirate Radio Boston
5.13846,Radio Ga Ga
5,Toynbee Radio
4.95,WGWR
4.90805,Blue Ocean Radio
4.78571,PeePee Vagina
4.41667,Happy Hanukkah Radio
4.18182,Chamber Pot Radio
4.10526,Pseudo Radio
3.93333,Turtlehead Radio

Avg Ratio 6.88793

Here’s a graph showing the number of unique pirate logging threads on the HFUnderground.com

Each thread represents a different shortwave pirate radio broadcast. The red bars on the right are the number of broadcasts during the shutdown per day. I’ve also drawn in green the average number of broadcasts per day during the month before the shutdown (6.9 per day) as well as during the shutdown (12.2). As you can see, activity is up 77%. This past weekend was extremely active, setting records.

There’s a relatively new religious pirate station, apparently from the west coast as that’s where most of the loggings have been from. The programming consists mostly of readings from the Old Testament, as well as religious commentary. YHWH being Yahweh without the vowels.

First reported on 5990 kHz on September 7, 2013, starting at 0220 UTC. Then on 6010 kHz on September 11, 2013 from 0440-0502 UTC, and then on 6010 kHz on September 15, 2013 from 0120 until 0204 sign off, all by Dan Sheedy of Encinitas, CA.

Bob LaRose of San Diego, CA heard YHWH on 9775 kHz on September 28, 2013 until 0133 UTC.

Glenn Hauser of OK heard them on October 8, 2013 on 9775 kHz starting at 0105 UTC, and heard past 0145 UTC.

Most recently, YHWH was heard on October 14, 2013 on 3234.95 kHz by Ron Howard of CA, who provided an audio recording of the ID.

Thanks to Glenn Hauser of DX Listening Digest for the above logs.

However, it looks like YHWH has been heard since at least August. I found this logging from W6SO of Woodland Hills, CA :

Is anyone else hearing a broadcaster (Station YHWH) in the 80 M band (3.845 Mhz using AM)? It is currently 18 August 2013 at about 04:15 GMT and this station has been there for over an hour now. Is this station in some way legitimate, or are they just bootlegging in the middle of our bands?

W7UUU in Tacoma, WA also heard that transmission.

Our own Pigmeat Martin heard YHWH on October 7, 2013 on 9775 kHz at around 2330 UTC (I suspect this was the UTC October 8 logging), so it is making it to the east coast.

There was some speculation that YHWH transmitted on the Sabbath (Friday night, UTC Saturday if from the west coast), but here’s a list of the reported transmissions:
3845 August 18, 2013: Sunday
5990 September 7, 2013: Saturday
6010 September 11, 2013: Wednesday
6010 September 15, 2013: Sunday
9775 October 8, 2013: Tuesday
3235 October 14, 2013: Monday

I’m not sure how well 6 MHz will propagate to the east coast at 0100 UTC, that is 6 PM local time on the west coast. 3 MHz is even more doubtful. 9 MHz should have the best chance.

If anyone knows of any loggings of YHWH lot listed above, please let me know, either via an email, comment to this blog post, or via a post to the HF Underground.

Some more updates: Token has heard this station as far back as May 18, 2013 on 6925 kHz at 0145 UTC. Also on July 27, 2013 at 0115 on 6950 kHz. The following weekend he heard YHWH just above the 40 meter ham band.

The other day, I picked up a very weak signal on the overnight SDR recording. At the end of the broadcast was an SSTV transmission, which I managed to decode as this:

Sealord had also picked up the broadcast, and copied the SSTV as well, slightly better than what I had:

Neither of us managed to get an ID, the signal was simply too weak.

Another listener in Australia let the op of the station know about the logging thread on the HF Underground. I suspect the SSTV image helped a lot in identifying what we had heard. The op then joined the thread, and identified for us what we had heard, Radio Totse, from New Zealand.

Here is the actual image that was transmitted, by the way:

So while the received image was indeed quite poor, it was certainly sufficient to identify what station we were hearing. This let me to think about modes such as SSTV could be utilized by operators to help listeners identify what they are hearing.

The received image was so poor that the text in the image was completely obliterated. But the overall image was recognizable. This SSTV transmission was made using Scottie DX mode, which is one of the slower SSTV modes. By slower I mean that each pixel takes longer to send, making it more robust under poor signal conditions. Hence the DX part of the mode name. If Scottie DX mode is not used, it is probably important to choose another commonly used mode, such as Scottie 1, to make it more likely that listeners will be able to decode it. Often when conditions are poor, manual triggering and selection of the SSTV mode is required. There’s too many SSTV modes to go through them all, guessing. Also, slower modes should be favored whenever possible, to increase the signal to noise ratio of the received image. The fastest monochrome mode I am aware of is the Robot 36 second mode.

Another image mode that could be utilized would be FAX. Scottie DX takes about a second to send each scan line, whereas fax mode takes half a second. But Scottie DX is a color mode, so the red, green, and blue components of each pixel are sent separately. Each color scan line taking about a third of a second. A fax scan line takes slightly longer to send, which may help under poor conditions. On the other hand, the fact that each color component of a pixel in Scottie DX mode is send three times, with a third of a second delay between components, may provide a time diversity element that helps improve reception.

A third image mode is Hellschreiber. In this mode, text is sent as raw pixels rather than ASCII values. Each pixel is sent twice, for two lines of text, again providing some time diversity. It can perform fairly well under poor conditions, with the human brain acting as the “DSP” to decipher what is being received. Periodic identifications could be made in Hellscreiber mode, aiding in identification of the station.

Hellschreiber has a very characteristic sound, making it easy to identify:

There is of course also CW mode. CW is one of the most robust modes, cutting through the static when other modes fail. And it’s not necessary to use any additional equipment to decode CW, just what is between your ears. (In fact a major downside to CW is that most software decoders for morse code are actually quite poor, compared to the human brain. CW is simply a very difficult mode for software to decode) The downside, of course, is that you have to know morse code, something that many listeners don’t. There are several pirates already that do send short CW IDs, Blue Ocean Radio for example would often send “BOR” in CW, which was very recognizable, even to those of us who are not extremely proficient at CW. Shorter is probably better with CW IDs, sending an abbreviation of the station name when possible, to make it more likely that listeners without advanced CW skills will be able to decode it.

Finally another digital mode that could be used is PSK31. PSK31 is also quite robust, and the software decoders for it are generally both quite good and readily available. It’s a fairly fast mode, several characters per second typically, so station IDs along with contact information (email address, for example) could be periodically sent. For some time I have wondered if PSK31 could be transmitted continuously as part of the program audio, but at a reduced volume, so that it did not interfere with the programming, but was still strong enough for software to decode. It coul dbe treated as a sort of RDS for pirate radio, continuously transmitting text that included the station name, contact instructions, as well as information about the music being played, current programming, etc. Some experimentation would be required to see if this was indeed feasible, and what the optimum PSK31 frequency would be (it may not be the standard 1000 Hz).

Operators could use one or more of these modes to increase the probability that listeners will be able to identify what station they are listening to, and make it more likely that they will be able to contact the station. This provides benefits for the operator as well, since they will get more feedback about their broadcasts. Certainly a win-win for everyone.