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Wednesday, April 18, 2007

Update on Radio Miraya

SUDAN - Regarding the information that R. Miraya should be on SW in March:
I asked several of the Sudanese guys working with us about radio in Southern Sudan, their homeland. They tell me there is an FM station operating in Juba, a key city in Southern Sudan. The station is called Radio Miraya, Radio Mirror, something to do with the UN program "UN Mirror". The FM outlet is broadcasting on 101 MHz. Other than this little else is known to them, us.

Given the UN Missions elsewhere, one has to believe what Jeffery Heyman, UNPRS has told you. SW would be the answer to blanket cover the vast Sudanese bush area. We are far away from Juba and Southern Sudan; we are in the extreme west of Sudan about mid way between the north/south Sudan borders, a stone throw away from the Chad/Sudan frontier.

We receive R Sudan SW from Khartoum daily on 7200 kHz; at night the MW band is full of signals from Sudan, Chad, Libya, Central African Republic, Egypt, etc. DX-wise, many good signals from most of Northern Africa; Kenya has a large MW network. Weekend nights bring fair to good signals from several Euro Pirates on SW, which are a big hit here in the compound.

If we hear anything more of UN Radio here, I will let you know. Besides my DX gear, the company has a large HF back-up system in the communication bunker, a HF Log Periodic on a 56' tower. I have spent many off duty hours listening off that antenna. I have a small hub of six 250m beverage antennas leading back to my little house in the compound. I brought along a Icom IC-706 MKIIG and a Sony 2010, but Khartoum is not granting Amateur licenses to foreigners in this area of Sudan. So I can only listen to the familiar voices from NA. I have spoken to a few guys working with various NGO's that have been granted licenses, they however are not in the Darfur area.
(Joe Talbot, Darfur-SDN, DSWCI DXW Mar 21/BC-DX # 803)