A commentary on what appears to be the imminent death of broadcasting on the longwave band

foreign this is a video about the slow death of long wave those of you that have been a subscriber of my channel since I started it in 2015 well some of you at least will know that uh longwave is my favorite band and it has been dying a slow death since then um I can't really uh imagine there being no broadcast signals left on Long wave although that day May well be coming for me it all started when I was a kid I got into radio at a very young age you've seen some of the receivers that I owned and um from the age of you know eight or nine I wanted a shortwave radio um and didn't get one until I was 16. but what I did have was a radio that covered long wave medium wave and FM and so long wave was the one band that you could listen to at night the volume turned low uh and here foreign stations um but but hear them differently to how you would listen to them on medium wave where conditions of propagation change very rapidly and obviously um am medium wave signals essentially being Sky wave suffer from Dynamic changes in propagation fading in or out you know Etc um Qs Baker qrm you know channels overloaded with long wave being the propagation you know being um dominated as a ground wave then if you can hear foreign station or distance station on Long wave then you can hear it and there's you know there's never any fading um some of the long way stations from even a few years ago were so powerful you could hear them during the day as well and I think that it was as a kid not having access to a shortwave radio um and haven't you know essentially being used to listening to stuff on medium wave and not hearing it very well um you could listen to you know European stations on Long wave very clearly and I think that's kind of where it started I can remember with using the Hitachi radio that I got for my birthday well actually I got it for Christmas um as a replacement to a cheaper radio that I got um you you would have seen it on on my previous video particularly with that radio I used to stay up really late into the early hours of the morning tuning through long wave listen you know listening to those foreign stations tuning through the non-directional beacons that I could hear in am not really understanding what they are um and it's kind of stuck with me um and since I got back into dxing into radio in 2015 so eight years ago um the long Wave band has further diminished um so I I thought I would do a review on what's happened in the past few years um but I wanted to start by going back back a bit further in time I had this kind of romantic Vision that um that in Years Gone by during the golden years of long wave that there were like hundreds or thousands of stations along wave and of course that was never the case because you know the long Wave band is only about 150 kilohertz wide um whereas you know the medium Wave band um you know is more than a megahertz wide so the so that was never going to be the case so what I did was I went back through a few old editions of the world radio and TV handbook started with 1976 and checked it out and there were 72 stations listed on Long wave in 1976. um fast forward uh 22 years to 1998 and there were 58 stations uh listed um fast forward again to 2016 which is the first wrth edition I bought when I got back into radio and it had gone down to 28 stations and then in 2023 the latest edition there are 18 stations listed now the 2023 and 2016 editions include multiple Transmissions so for example Radio 4 on 198 kilohertz um on Long wave includes the lower power transmission sites so you know that's kind of where we are in 76 when I was a very small child there were 72 stations in 2023 there were 18 so obviously numbers have diminished as as we all know um but it seems to be accelerating so if we now go through those stations that have left the band um since I got into back into radio in 2015 so France inter on 162 kilohertz which as you now knows basically a long wave time signal from Halloween started um broadcasting in 1952 and closed down on the 31st of December 2016. um these the the image that you can see is a signal as received by by myself and then in 2019 the signal from Europe won felsberg on 183 kilohertz shut down uh again on the 31st of December uh they started in 1955. um radio zone now from um the Czech Republic on 270 kilohertz to Palmer the transmitter site um they've been broadcasting on that frequency since 1989. they shut down the 31st of December 2021 um and then RTL 234 kilohertz from uh Byler shut down on the 31st of December uh 2022 and they'd been transmitting on that frequency since 1932. um I uh RTE radio one two five two kilohertz uh shut down uh in April uh this year they've been transmitting since 1989 um and iuv Iceland 207 from uh idar uh shut down also in 2023 at the end of February um and they had been broadcasting since 1938. so you know some of these stations have been around you know 90 years uh and you know so you know and those are the stations that have closed just since I've been listening to the radio since I started the channel basically um the other one worth mentioning is tr1 watam Radio I'm from Turkmenistan uh 279 kilohertz I used to copy their signal a few years ago um albeit with very poor modulation um and as you can see the the world radio and TV handbook 20 23 Edition um doesn't include that station um in their listing so as far as they're concerned the station no is no longer on air I don't know um whether that's true or not wrth is usually pretty accurate but I have seen I get a couple of um newsletters sent to me every month and their reports are coming in that tr1 on 279 kilohertz is still going um but uh obviously either a very weak signal hand or with you know very poor modulation so I guess the jury's still out on whether tr1's dead or not but certainly not listed um in the world radio and TV handbook so what's next what's closing down next well are you the Iceland um 189 kilohertz is going to stop transmitting next year 2024 um that's their transmitter site in uh gefuscala it's a real shame I really enjoy listening to um Iceland on Long wave and have done so for several years now but they're stopping in 2024 following on from closure of the uh idar signal 207 kilohertz um Dr Lang bulge 243 kilohertz apologies if I'm incorrectly pronounce that from kalenborg they're stopping on the 31st of December 2023 this year that's a real shame um that station has been on here for a long time and um for me the best interval signal on the radio um harks back to the golden days of radio and um yeah that for me would be particularly sad day when um when that signal on 243 and the those Chimes uh of their interval signal can no can no longer be heard uh real shame and then closer to home the BBC have been sort of beating around the bush a little bit but finally announced that um the BBC Radio 4 and 198 kilohertz signal from droitwich and a couple of other transmitters will also close in 2024 and you know that that's a real shame it you know it really is um if for nothing else I'm gonna miss listening to test match special so uh listen to The Cricket on Long wave in the garden sat in the garden with a drink the perfect way to do it I know it's available on BBC 5 live on dab Etc but it just won't be the same um so so yeah so then the next three stations scheduled to close um in the coming months so what are the reasons why are all these stations closing well declining listen to Bass is is often quoted that goes for all AM radio and that includes medium wave many stations in the UK and across Europe obviously have closed down on medium wave the X's take that as well take a positive spin from that because as all the European uh stations close it opens up channels and Pathways for North American DX and South American um so from from some uh dxers uh every cloud has a silver lining so as the as the Euro as the medium Wave band enters itself of European stations all that it allows more DX through um but it's also the reason cited by um RT RTE Radio 1 said essentially the same thing energy costs exacerbated by Russia invade in Ukraine of course um the somewhat I think I read somewhere that uh the a typical long-wave transmitter these days costs 1 800 pounds a day to run because of the uh energy costs which I can imagine um there's the cost and cost of maintenance for the transmitter and antenna Hardware I guess that goes without saying um and also technological obsolescence so basically you know you can hear all this stuff on other platforms um you know you can listen online on the internet podcasts you know dab Etc so they're the reasons that are cited for the closures which you know I understand that um do I agree with it not necessarily am I uh in in a minority demographic as a someone who's um very passionate about radio yes probably um so it's a shame but um you know it's a fact of life that you know am broadcasting costs a lot of money and there are cheaper ways of doing it you know I still think it might be mistaken today's volatile world you know when other types of when other platforms fail when other infrastructure fails radio can always be there um but you know it is it is what it is and that's where we are um so what's left well Algeria are still on 153 as our Romania um antenna satello um there are still signals um being transmitted uh from Mongolia to Mongolia National radio Services there's the 164 kilohertz signal which I've uh I think that's the one I've heard audio I've copied audio on thanks audio and um but every now and then you see um the carrier on one of my sdrs so Morocco medi1 from nador 171 kilohertz will still be there um Iceland will be gone Radio 4 will be gone um Mongolian 209 kilohertz and pulsky radio 225 are still around um and then you've got Mongolia again on 227 um Denmark countenburg uh will will be gone and then you have Algeria again on 252 who became obviously much more prominent when RTE shut down on the same frequency so so there you go there'll be three or four stations left on Long wave in Europe and North Africa um and you know how long will they be on air I don't know um what's interesting is that I think Algeria is the largest country uh in Africa it's huge I can't remember if it's like eight or nine times bigger than the UK Morocco is a relatively large country and obviously long wave is useful for broadcasting across over large distances so I don't know whether you know whether that makes lot the long-wave broadcasting model um uh a better fit for countries such as Algeria and Morocco where there might be less infrastructure and vast expanses of uh desert Etc um so maybe maybe the the transmission from nador Morocco and Algeria on 153 and 252 kilohertz will remain obviously the signal for 1252 they broadcast in French the 153 signal broadcasting Arabic so it's possible they will continue um not sure about Poland it's quite a large country um be nice to to be nice to imagine that they would stay but you know and same for Romania antenna satellite I think is it's basically a uh a radio station that's um uh the demographic is basically for people living out in the countryside effectively I can't remember the there's a literal translation but it's like almost someone Romanian will correct me but you know Countryside radio effectively um so I'd like to think that there would still be a couple of stations on Long wave in a few years from now but um you know who knows I'm not sure um it'd be nice actually if if new stations were to uh um were to come back and come on and come you know and get on air but again I think that's highly unlikely um but you never know so there you go so that's my brief summary of uh this what's happened with long wave since I got back into radio I can't say anything other than it's it's a little bit depressing but um it's a sign of the times and it's the way things are going and um you know as I said the medium Wave band is also emptying rather rapidly um and it it's a real shame as far as I'm concerned but uh um maybe I'll do another another video um in the same vein in a year from now and we'll uh and have another look but uh yeah I guess you know the technology has been around for more than a hundred years um and there have been transmissions on long way for uh I think for about 100 years um give or take um so it's quite amazing that what is essentially the same technology uh you know the same fundamentals the physics um the technology you know is you know is it is achieving the same thing it's been around 100 years you know that's when radio started well at least broadcast transmission started about 100 years ago um and you know that although in Rapid decline now it's still with us so uh um you know there aren't many other areas of Technology where uh you know where you can say well you know that Tech's been around for you know 10 decades and still going so there you go anyway I hope you enjoyed that um and uh thank you very much for watching and uh I'll catch up with you on the channel um please leave your comments uh I very much appreciate them so thank you very much uh 73. oh [Music] [Music]

Channel: Oxford Shortwave Log

Views: 29,840

Keywords: Longwave, Oxford Shortwave Log, radio, AM, AM radio, radio closing

Id: GORYt5DcrmI

Length: 18min 44sec (1124 seconds)

Published: Fri Aug 04 2023