Caribbean ch2

[ukdx]

My first post to this forum so hi everyone! Now I can't pretend to have logged quite as much as Hugh down in sunny Portugal as I'm another hop north but I'm hoping someone may be able to help on this one.

During an Es opening to the Caribbean on Friday at 1649z I managed to grab a brief clip of video from a signal on A2, it was an 8P offset on 55259.985. I've attached a gif which shows the original image top left and three other noise reduced versions. I think there's a logo top right but it doesn't look like anything I've been able to find online. I'm hoping someone a bit closer might recognise it so we can confirm the country. Initially we thought it was Venezuela but now I'm not sure, Puerto Rico is 4300 miles from here and Venezuela 4700 so I'm more than keen to locate this TX :)

There's the entire thing on youtube including some audio from it, not sure if it helps as it's a bit brief! http://youtube.com/watch?v=tXVqPiPdJtU

Cheers,

Paul
Newhaven, UK

[cd637299]

Welcome to the club!

I live in southeast FL where WPBT is.....the pic in the upper right looks sharpest, but I cannot make hide or hair of anything.....there does look like a logo in upper right, but nothing like I have seen.

I'd rule out TVes in Venezuela (even though the guy looks a little like El Presidente Chavez), as TVes' logo is in upper left, and nothing like that in upper right.

I suggest you check out Danny Oglethorpe's sites:

www.tvdxexpo.com
www.tvdxtips.com

Look for Caribbean/South America logos. Sorry I cannot help further.

Now....when am *I* gonna see Europe? (I know, I know....when I fly there)

cd

[ukdx]

Thanks cd, the same signal has been sitting at video level for the last hour or so this afternoon! About 1415z it sounded as if it was a soap opera or drama in Spanish, at times it appeared like it may have had captions or white subtitles along the bottom of the screen. At one point for about two minutes I had to open up the IF width to stop the D100 overloading as the signal was peaking S9+5dB on my Icom. I'll review the video and see if there's anything that resolved on it. I could make out characters on screen but not sure if it was that clear on disk.

I'd have thought one of the power house signals on 48.242/48.250 or 49.75 would have made the trip over to you OK, some of the big 6m stations report them quite a bit although I appreciate they may have more than their fair share of metalwork in the sky :)

Paul

[cd637299]

I looked at these 1 more time, and know no more than last time....however, if I were you, I would go to Danny's sites, click on any link to a TV station with a website that is using ch 2, and hopefully click on a video link to their news report----many stations have video of their news, and this looks like a news report.

I wonder if this is not Suriname or Guyana, each of which has a ch 2, but not in Spanish.

I have a filter which blocks You Tube, but I hope to have it unblocked this week, as I myself would like to put up my DX from the past on it.

cd

[cd637299]

Also I would personally rule out Cuba....their news report has an "N" in bottom right....also, these graphics look too good to be Cuba, although Cuba's technology seems to be catching up.

cd

[ukdx]

I have a filter which blocks You Tube, but I hope to have it unblocked this week
cd

I didn't realise that, the audio has a music bed under it so don't think it would be news. Although going OT for a moment, one place I've seen them still do this is Bahrain, it sticks in the memory a bit because one of the classical pieces they use is the theme tune to Monty Python :laughing: I think I read somewhere else on this board that Cuba are all on 0 offsets, this was on an 8P but once I've finished editing todays videos I'll go search from Danny's site.

If you are on ADSL this is a 4mb mpg of it, I've left the noise either side to capture the audio, it's distorted due to the narrow bandwidth Caribbean1 (http://www.ukdx.org.uk/tv/caribbean.mpg) and this 12mb file gives an idea of the strength of it today, it remained at this level for over an hour this afternoon! Caribbean2 (http://www.ukdx.org.uk/tv/a2_060708.mpg)

[Danny]

Welcome, Paul. You and Hugh are certainly doing better with the TAs than we are on this side of the Atlantic.

[cd637299]

Paul,

Here is a question.....do you happen to live in Glasgow, or have you ever lived there? and are you now maybe about 23 years old? If so, I think I know you. True, there are a lotta Pauls in UK, but how many are in this hobby?

cd

[cd637299]

The 2 clips were way too short to hear anything.....but....going back I was reading your 2nd post. You mentioned possibly subtitles. Well, many Cuban TV shows are from other countries and they add subtitles on the bottom. But did you not say the audio was Spanish?

If this is not a news show, it may have been Cuba. If you have a much much longer sound clip, maybe I or someone else can figure it out.

NOTE: Cuban TV does not carry commercials at all. Were there commercials?

cd

[cd637299]

Oh shoot! There's another site which lists offsets for Caribbean channels (but not South America IIRC):

www.dxinfocentre.com (prepared by William Hepburn in Canada)....He lists all known channels in the West Indies & possibly Central America, listing offsets as well (I was the one who posted that all were zeroes in Cuba, gleaning from the above site).

cd

[ukdx]

No, not from Glasgow, I'm right down the other end, south of London overlooking the English Channel but oh to be 23 again :) Hugh emailed me a short excerpt of todays audio pointing out the word Telemundo and someone else has heard Puerto Rico mentioned, I'll confess my Spanish is non existant and I missed both these references. Both todays and Fridays signals were on the exact same frequency down to the Hz and with both being Spanish I think it likely it was indeed Telemundo on Friday. What a shame this is the last season we'll have to see it!

[cd637299]

I'm enclosing my photo of WKAQ 2 (Telemundo PR) from 2006. This was during news.....apparently the graphics have changed.

www.telemundopr.com is their site, but apparently they are in some sort of site overhaul ("Faltan 9 dias" on their homepage = "9 days to go").

Anyway FWIW here is the foto.

cd

[Humberto]

There are two clues in the audio of the second mpeg, here are the transcription:

First. 00:10 "Descubre lo que innova tiene para ti en www.innovashop.tv" (www pronounced as "triple doble u")

Second. 00:34: "El siguiente programa es uno pagado, NBC telemundo of Puerto Rico y Telemundo .........no se hace responsable del contenido, ventas..."

Its a standar disclaimer for infomercials.

TA DX¡¡ WOW!!

Saludos

[ukdx]

Thanks for all the feedback on this one and for the transcription Humberto. What surprised me about Sundays reception was the duration of it, just a shame the video quality wasn't as good as Friday although it was stronger at times. There's been lots of talk on a ham chat room I use about the mode of Es over such a long distance and it is difficult to believe that three or four reflections could be maintained over such a long period and distance, the current theory is some form of chordal Es 'funnels' the signal along the E layer minimising path and reflection loss.

Paul
www.ukdx.org.uk