Let’s see now what happens next in our sequence of information regarding the island called Diego Garcia. Before we get to the radio scene though, we note that the first postage stamps issued on Diego Garcia, in 1968, showed a series of land and sea animals from the Seychelles Islands. These stamps were overprinted in black with the initials BIOT, identifying the British Indian Ocean Territory. Since then the postal service in the British Indian Ocean Territory has issued more than 500 different stamps which have been in use mainly on the capital city island Diego Garcia.
As a result of negotiations between the United States and Great Britain, work on a large joint radio communication station on Diego Garcia began in 1971. Two facilities were constructed. The transmitter station is located at the northern edge of the island on the western side of the lagoon, adjacent to the south of what was the huge circular Wullenwever receiver station, or the Elephant Cage as these massive aerial systems were known colloquially. The receiver station is located a dozen miles distant almost at the southern tip of the island.
Very little has been made known of the technical equipment at the American communication station on Diego Garcia. However, we do know that at least some of their transmitters are rated at 3 kW; the international callsign is NKW; and one of its major purposes is for rapid communication with security personnel and with wide area international events in the Asian and Middle Eastern scene.
In 1978, for example, a total of 78 shortwave frequencies were listed for use at station NKW. This shortwave station is still on the air to this day with the transmission of electronically coded information. Beginning in the year 2000, AFN American Forces Network programming was broadcast from NKW and beamed to American forces in Afghanistan. The daytime frequency was 12579 kHz, and the nighttime frequency was 4319 kHz, both in USB Upper Side Band mode.
The shortwave channels were heard, and verified, by international radio monitors living in Europe, North America, India, Sri Lanka, and the South Pacific. This program relay was on the air for a period of 15 years, and it came to an end in mid 2015.Perhaps of even greater interest to the international radio monitor than their program rely on shortwave was their mediumwave station which was on the air with an irregular callsign, and obviously with approval from the local authorities. The AFRTS American Forces Radio TV station on Diego Garcia identified on air as AFDG, American Forces Diego Garcia, and it was launched as Radio Reindeer with 25 watts on 1475 kHz in 1972.
The original studio and transmitter were housed in a back room in the Special Services Building, and most of the programming was produced locally and very informally. Inserted programming came from AFRTS studios in the United States. The existence of AFDG mediumwave on Diego Garcia was unrecognized internationally until the noted international radio monitor in Colombo Sri Lanka, Victor Goonetilleke heard this lonesome and isolated station on 1475 kHz. At that stage, it was said to be operating with 50 watts.
Four years later, the station was on the air with an increase in power to 250 watts though the operating channel was still the split frequency 1475 kHz. Accurate reception reports were received from Japan, New Zealand, India, the Maldive Islands, and Sri Lanka, all of which were ultimately confirmed by the volunteer station staff. Dr. S. Chowdhury from the Indian DX Club International in Calcutta visited South India for the express purpose of listening to AFDG and making sample recordings of its programming.
Around the mid 1980s, the station moved up 10 kHz to another split channel 1485 kHz. Then during the year 2015, the mediumwave transmitter, a professionally made CPA transmitter from the United States was silenced forever, though the 135 ft tower still stands.
An FM transmitter with 10 watts on 101.9 MHz began a full time relay from the mediumwave station in 1978 and nearly 10 years later, a new 200 watt transmitter was installed. These days, AFDG is on the air from 2 FM transmitters with separate programming, 99.1 and 101.9 MHz, together with 4 channels of TV at 200 watts each.
In addition BFBS radio and TV programming from London is also available over the air on Diego Garcia on several channels, some of which is linked with programming from Nepal in the Nepali language. Cable & Wireless was established in Diego Garcia in 1982; and there was an amateur radio station on the island, a club station with the call VQ9X, for a period of nearly 23 years running from 1991 to 2013.
QSLs from AFDG mediumwave are quite rare, and these were issued by mail and electronically to a few international radio monitors who were fortunate enough to log this exotic little radio station. Victor Goonetilleke heard the station again while on a DXpedition to a small island near Colombo Sri Lanka and he received two QSLs by post in the same envelope; one verifying his most recent mediumwave logging, and the other verifying an earlier shortwave report.
Another international radio monitor who was living in India at the time, heard AFDG Diego Garcia mediumwave while he was on a professional itinerary to the Maldive Islands in 1985. After sending a reception report to the station several times, he received two self-prepared QSL cards through the post, one in 1986 and another in 1987.
(AWR-Wavescan/NWS #537)
