|
|
"Wavescan" is a weekly program for long distance radio hobbyists produced by Dr. Adrian M. Peterson, Coordinator of International Relations for Adventist World Radio. AWR carries the program over many of its stations (including shortwave). Adrian Peterson is a highly regarded DXer and radio historian, and often includes features on radio history in his program. We are reproducing those features below, with Dr. Peterson's permission and assistance.
Wavescan N583, April 26, 2020
Another Chapter in the Radio Scene on the Islands of Vanuatu
It was on Monday, April 6 (2020), that the devastating Cyclone Harold struck the islands of Vanuatu in the South Pacific with sustained winds at 165 miles per hour, and exceptional gusts in excess of 185 miles per hour. The high velocity winds, together with a heavy rainfall measuring 15 inches, wrought an intensive havoc on all of the northern islands in islandic Vanuatu, damaging and destroying buildings and stripping the palm tree of their foliage. It is stated that 90% of the homes in the town of Luganville were totally destroyed or badly damaged.
This massive South Pacific storm knocked out inter-island communications throughout Vanuatu, and it took some time for the central government in Port Vila to learn the damage impact throughout its nation of scattered islands. Vanuatu is made up of 82 islands, 65 of which are inhabited, that are stretched out over 800 miles of the vast South Pacific Ocean.
News about the onward progress of the cyclone was presented by many news media in New Zealand and Australia. The ZB news network in New Zealand reported that Air New Zealand made an air drop of needed supplies and foods. A similar plane loaded with supplies from Australia made a mercy flight to Vanuatu but was unable to land due to runway damage and debris, and it simply returned home to Australia.
Commercial radio stations in Australia presented many news reports of the progressive impact of Cyclone Harold and the worsening conditions on the ground throughout the islands. Many mediumwave stations in coastal Queensland carried the cyclone reports, including commercial stations 4RO in Rockhampton with 5 kW on 990 kHz, and 4CC in neighboring Gladstone on 927 kHz, also with 5 kW. This two-station network, together with their half a dozen relay stations, reported that the worst-hit islands were Espiritu Santo, Melo, Pentecost, and the capital city island, Efate.
Most of the local radio broadcasting stations in Vanuatu were off the air during the massive impact of Cyclone Harold, though Radio New Zealand International was on the air shortwave with cyclone information. However, nothing was heard in Vanuatu from Australia due to the fact that Radio Australia was long-since closed and off the air, and its stations have been dismantled.
The first wireless station in the New Hebrides/Vanuatu was inaugurated on Iririki Island, opposite the capital city Port Vila on Efate Island in 1910, and it is still on the air to this day. The original callsign was HNV, though their callsign nowadays is YJM.
During the Pacific War, both the Japanese and the Americans on Espiritu Santo island operated communication and tactical radio transmitters for both local and international coverage. Then there was also the American AFRS mediumwave station WRUR that was on the air at Luganville on Espiritu Santo Island from 1944 to 1946 with 1 kW on 1045 kHz.
During the 1930s, the usage of communication radio was introduced into the New Hebrides Islands for the benefit of official government units, Christian mission stations and schools, foreign plantation stations, and the larger business organizations. The shortwave radio transmitter and receiver was a useful communication tool for the transmission of important information.
However, in addition to the transmission of business matters, the radio also provided a relief from the boredom of isolation for the expatriate citizens with the sharing of news and information. This shortwave radio service also provided the opportunity for some form of socialization. In this way, small, local informal radio networks were formed.
Prior to the commencement of the Pacific War in 1941, the British developed a network of small radio transmitters throughout the New Hebrides Islands (and elsewhere) from this already-formed basis of local communication. These little local radio stations, together with others that were officially set up, grew into what became the Coast Watch Service throughout the Pacific Islands during World War II.
Popular for use in the Coast Watch Service were the combination transmitters and receivers that were developed for this purpose by AWA in Australia. The original AWA model 3A was the basis for an improved model 3B, and this was improved into the more famous model 3BZ. The 3BZ transmitter, with an output power of 13 watts, was crystal controlled, thus ensuring stability of the operating frequency.
A hundred of these Coast Watch Stations were operating in hidden areas during the Pacific War. For the New Hebrides, net control was established at Port Vila on Efate Island.
After the end of the Pacific War, the facilities and the procedures of the Coast Watch Service in the New Hebrides were maintained, and thus the Condominium Teleradio Network came into operation. Ultimately, a small radio transmitter together with its associated equipment, was installed on most of the islands that form the now nation of Vanuatu, with additional units also installed at some of the major city, town and village centers.
The Vanuatu Teleradio Network is still in use to this day throughout the island nation, and only in very recent time have some of the lesser islands been connected into the net. The first shortwave communication station on Tegua Island, for example, was installed in 2007, though this unit fell into disrepair more recently. Other islands on which Teleradio has been installed are Vanua Lava, Gaua and Mota.
The 1955 edition of the WR(TV)HB carries a brief entry for the New Hebrides. This entry states that the Condominium Teleradio Network occasionally carries announcements and messages on shortwave, with 15 watts on 6900 kHz. However, the published entry states that this was not a regular radio broadcasting service. In actual fact, this Teleradio service had already been on the air for a decade, or perhaps even a score of years.
On the next occasion, we plan to present the story of the introduction of a genuine radio broadcasting service in Vanuatu.
Ancient DX Report 1921
During the year 1921 there was a tremendous increase throughout the world in the usage of wireless and radio, and this was for two widely different purposes:
During this same year 1921, RCA was finalizing the construction and installation of what was intended to be the world's largest wireless station. The massive Radio Central, the RCA Rocky Point wireless station WQK, sat upon a slice of land on Long Island New York measuring ten square miles.
When completed, the station would hold twelve longwave wireless transmitters at 200 kW each, together with a stupendous antenna system running for many miles and supported on tall towers arranged like the spokes in a wheel. Each of the twelve antenna systems would be three miles long, utilizing 25 miles of aerial wire in each antenna system.
The official opening day for this new electrical behemoth was Saturday, November 5, 1921, and President Warren G. Harding pressed a button in the White Hose that set the apparatus in operation. At that stage, communication station WQK was then on the air, though initially with only one transmitter and just one antenna system.
Over in England, a similar longwave communication station was taken into service on August 18, 1921. Station GBL, with its 250 kW transmitter was established at Leafield near Oxford as the first station, and the European end, of what was intended to become the Imperial Wireless Chain that stretched from England to Australia.
The eleven year old 3 kW spark wireless station on Triangle Island out in the Pacific Ocean from British Columbia in Canada was closed, and it was replaced by a new station at Bull Harbour on Hope Island under the same callsign, VAG.
On May 1 (1921), wireless communication in Morse Code was established between the United States and Vietnam in South East Asia. The pathway for this new communication system ran via a network of American navy wireless stations; from station NPG in San Francisco California, via NPM in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, and NPN on Guam, and NPN in Cavite in the Philippines, and thence via two French colonial stations in Vietnam, HZA in Saigon and HVA in Hanoi.
During this same 1921 year, the Dutch-operated Batavia Petroleum company opened their own wireless communication station, PKF, at Balikpapan on the island of Borneo; and the island of Tonga in the South Pacific opened their own station, VSB, in their capital city, Nuku'alofa, on the island of Tongatapu.
Listed as the wireless station on the world's smallest inhabited island, station CGI on small Willis Island off the east coast of Australia was opened for service on November 7 (1921). Daily weather reports were sent by Morse Code to the AWA station VIC at Cooktown, on the Queensland coast of Australia.
On the radio broadcasting scene, we note that Sydney Neuman, with AWA at Canterbury in suburban Melbourne, conducted a series of test transmissions from their station 3ME on 273 kHz longwave, beginning in January. Of major significance was the inauguration of amateur station 2CM as a broadcasting station with Charles Maclurcan in Sydney during the year 1921, and he was granted Australia's first radio broadcasting license.
Over in New Zealand, Professor Robert Jack at the University of Otago in Dunedin on the South Island, made the first radio broadcast in their islandic country on November 17 with a program of recorded music.
At the request of Sir George Lloyd, governor of Bombay, the Times of India and the Postal and Telegraph office cooperated with the production of a special radio broadcast in August. His excellency the governor heard this broadcast in Poona, more than one hundred miles distant.
Back in the old country there was an early broadcast of interest during midyear 1921. On Saturday, June 4, at the running of the English Derby at Epsom Downs in Surrey, England, a radio transmitter on the back tray of a truck carried a running commentary of this very popular horse race.
Over in the United States at the beginning of the year, on January 3, radio station 9XM (now WHA) at the University of Wisconsin in Madison began the broadcast of weather information in voice mode. And then at the end of the year, on December 9, Charles Herrold in San Jose, California was granted the callsign KQW for his program broadcasting station (now KCBS).
On the shortwave scene, Frank Conrad at KDKA, and at his home station 8XK, together with two or three other amateur station operators, continued their experimental transmissions on shortwave. They also noted the growing number of mediumwave stations that could be heard with a stronger signal on their unsuppressed shortwave harmonics.
Both AT&T with 2XJ at Deal in New Jersey, and MIT at Cambridge Massachusetts, were also experimenting with shortwave transmissions towards the end of the year 1921.