Home | Back to Wavescan Index

"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 N586, May 17, 2020

Paraguay on Shortwave - Part 3: After the War

In 1970, Arthur Cushen, the noted international radio monitor in New Zealand, declared that the most difficult country to hear and to verify on shortwave in South America was without doubt Paraguay. He made this statement in his October (1970) report in the Australian magazine Radio and Hobbies, and he mentioned that during the previous 35 years, he had been able to hear and verify only three shortwave stations in Paraguay. Cushen's 35-year observation covered the entire history of shortwave broadcasting in Paraguay, right up until that time, in 1970.

In our Wavescan program a month back, we left the story of shortwave broadcasting in Paraguay in South America in 1943, which was just after the middle of World War II in Europe. At that stage, there were only three shortwave stations on the air in Paraguay, and these were:

In our program today, we return to the shortwave scene in Paraguay, and this time we pick up the story from the war years onward. Back then, as always, each shortwave station carried a tandem program relay from the mediumwave station. Even Radio Nacional, the intended external radio service from Paraguay, carried most of its programming from their mediumwave service.

Callsigns in Paraguay during the wartime era were regularized, with mediumwave callsigns beginning with the two letters ZP followed by a number, and shortwave callsigns beginning with the three letters ZPA followed by a number. In each case, the number was the same for each pair of transmitters, mediumwave and shortwave. For example, as noted above: The callsigns for Radio Nacional mediumwave and shortwave were ZP1 and ZPA1.

The shortwave relays were at best irregular, due to shortages in sufficient financing, as well as inadequacies in reliable equipment, and the unavailability of adequately trained technical personnel. In addition, most if not all of the shortwave stations in Paraguay were operating at less than their licensed power level due to the high cost of electricity. Then too, sometimes a shortwave station in Paraguay has gone silent for a lengthy period of time, only to be revived again when the equipment has been refurbished, or new equipment has been installed.

To complicate the shortwave scene in Paraguay, on several occasions a specific callsign has been reissued due to change of ownership and/or change of location. In any case, though, the station title or slogan is far more significant to the radio listeners in South America than is the official callsign.

As would be expected, Radio Nacional on shortwave has experienced a very long life span, with two thirds of a century of on-air service stretching from 1942 to 2009. During this lengthy era, Radio Nacional has undergone several major developments, including changes in location for both the studios and transmitters, and also variations in the application of its callsigns.

Another longtime shortwave station in Paraguay was Radio Encarnacion, which was launched by Jaime Yankelevich of Radio Belgrano LR1 in Buenos Aires Argentina in 1943. Radio Encarnacion, both mediumwave ZP5 and shortwave ZPA5, was installed at Encarnacion, a regional city that is located in Paraguay right at the southern border with Argentina.

The programming for Radio Encarnacion was generally an off-air relay from Radio Belgrano LR1 in Buenos Aires. The original mediumwave transmitter ZP5 radiated 5 kW on 920 kHz, and the original shortwave transmitter was a 1 kW unit made by Philips in Holland that was tuned to 11940 kHz.

The shortwave transmitter was withdrawn from service in 1975, and it was subsequently replaced by a half kilowatt Paraguayan-made Telectron transmitter eleven years later, in 1986. The shortwave programming from Radio Encarnacion on 11940 kHz was finally closed during the year 2002, at the end of half a century of on-air service.

Shortwave broadcasting in Paraguay began in the years 1935 and 1936 with the inauguration of half a dozen low-powered stations, each of which carried the programming of the parent mediumwave station. The shortwave broadcasting era in Paraguay ended with the close of Radio Nacional three quarters of a century later, in 2009.

But that is not really the end of the story. More about Paraguay on shortwave next time.