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Suspected US military stations Hammer 16 and Hammer 11 conducting radio checks on CONUS satcom 252.150. Their signals were super weak for me, but I could make out one of them reporting at checkpoint Budweiser. They seem to be able to hear each other just fine however.
Possible related traffic on 253.850 as well, which was referred to as channel 3.
Tags: CONUS
251.850 with a brief transmission from what sounded like Zoogie 81 calling Tanker Base for a radio check on Sat Bravo.
Tags: CONUS
267.050 radio check from Grumman AA60 (sound like) via CONUS.
Tags: CONUS
Spanish language traffic from “Ejército 2106” (Army 2106?) conducting radio checks and test counts.
Wire 06 attempting contact with Wire 78 for radio check on 251.850 “Sat Bravo”
Tags: CONUS
Lately, I’ve been hearing a regular amount of Spanish chatter on different UHF SATCOM frequencies. Here are several stations using 252.150 conducting radio checks and exchanging information. What caught my attention on this intercept was the mention of a camp in the sector of Kilómetro 41 and the mention of a specific point 500 meters below the point where Río Chinchiná and Río Cauca meet. These are very specific locations and after a bit of Googling, I was able to find an approximate location on this map. This puts them in the Caldas Department of Colombia, which is located a bit north of Pereira. Definitely interesting and bears watching.
251.850 CONUS: Draco 77 calling Draco 99 on “sat 2” for radio check.
Tags: CONUS
I recently heard some ham traffic being relayed by pirates on UHF SATCOM (263.675) – Someone was rebroadcasting: “CQ CQ CQ Parks on the Air KE8WLW in K-6803” which sounded like it was coming from HF SSB. A quick Google Search found that Parks on the Air (POTA) is a program that encourages amateur radio operators to get outdoors and operate from state and national parks. The park identifier “K-6803” is Vestaburg State Game Land according to the POTA website. Obviously these hams probably don’t realize pirates are rebroadcasting their traffic across US military satellites. As to why they would retransmit ham radio comms is a total mystery to me and quite strange. In addition, there was a lot of the other usual shenanigans, whistling and inappropriate noises being transmitted on the frequency. Here is a recording of the intercept. Caution: Use headphones if in public setting otherwise you might get strange looks from those around you. The ham stuff starts around the 1:55 marker.
Aircraft identifying as “Tail 10015” calling “Cactus” for radio checks on 262.125.
Tags: CONUS
I have logged more Spanish speaking stations over the past few days on UHF SATCOM. Just like the traffic on 258.650 from a couple weeks ago, I really don’t get the vibe that these are typical pirates. Today the stations were testing in both Spanish and English. Here are recordings of the recently logged traffic.
265.550: Stations w/ test counts, “hola hola hola holas” and asking “me copia?” – it sounds as if they were giving each other signal reports.
267.050: Person whispering into the radio. This was logged in the middle of the night. I cannot make out what they were saying except maybe “tienes tienes cuatro” (you have 4?) between the encoded traffic.
261.775: Test counts and radio checks in both Spanish and English.