In the U.S., pirate stations have popped up in recent years all over the country, from West Virginia to Washington state, according to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), which plays a continual game of whack-a-mole in an effort to keep them off the airwaves used by licensed broadcasters. MR. DOMBROWSKI: Yes, this is the fun part, the (inaudible). "By playing nonstop current pop music in a situation where this had never before been available, Caroline had within months a larger audience than all the BBC stations combined," Moore explains. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Well at least you are recycling. A new, raw, grassroots kind of pirate radio exploded from 1992 onwards. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: All right. Weve now covered the who, what, where, when, and how of pirate huntingbut what about why? MR. DOMBROWSKI: Well there was a version of the bill that passed the House first and now there is a similar bill being considered by Senate. So for that period of time they lose communications and they have to try to find another available channel to keep that communication line open. Compared to big-gun broadcasters, pirates are much more elusive game as very few announce their broadcasts in advance, and theres no telling where a pirates transmitter is located: it could be in their home, on a boat, or a portable one dropped in a remote location and later retrieved. The Moody Blues are one example of this." HowStuffWorks may earn a small commission from affiliate links in this article. So a transmitter that complies with the Part 15 requirements has a very small operating range, about 100 feet. MR. DOMBROWSKI: Yes, it's -- Pirate radio has been around for decades. So those are some of the challenges that you all have to tackle in taking on this important enforcement function. Among the most popular queries made by readers is, How can I find and hear pirate radio stations? To help answer this question, Im writing this primer. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: And we talked a little bit about why this is a problem. In the quieter winter months, stations seem to pop out of the ether. MR. DOMBROWSKI: Yes, everyone's dream job. It might be illegal in terms of IRS about the taxes that aren't be collected off the exchange of funds in the business that's going on behind doors. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: So when it comes to local law enforcement are they generally uninterested in taking this on or, you know, because you mentioned federal agents are often involved, it's federal courts, U.S. 2022-03-13 23:21:58 Storage_size 430.3 GB (in 25,377 files) Title Pirate Radio Airchecks. We get them in Virginia, we get them out in Illinois, even just remote areas of West Virginia they pop up. I used a pneumatic spud gun to launch an arborist's bag to deploy my 50' end fed antenna 40' up into a tree. Other times though you might have reason to suspect that they are in on it, they are getting a kickback. The antenna is not where the people are necessarily or where the rest of the equipment is. Give me an address or an intersection in the town that you are picking it up on. MR. DOMBROWSKI: We do make them aware that they are contributing to this illegal activity. And those parameters, you know, restrict your operation and the coverage of your station because we have a whole engineering study that needs to be done so you don't cause interference to other stations. Alan Roes Music Programmes on Shortwave, List of QRP General Coverage Amateur Radio Transceivers, List of VHF/UHF Multimode Amateur Radio Transceivers, How To Tune In Pirate Radio Broadcasts on Shortwave, https://swling.com/blog/category/pirate-radio/, LRA 36 (Arcangel San Gabriel, Antarctica) Test Broadcasts on March 1st and 4th, 2023, Radio Waves: AM Buzzkill, AM FEMA Push, AM Devitalization, and RFI-Blocking Chips, Bob Zanottis presentation to the Fairlawn Amateur Radio Club (Part 2), Radio Waves: The DLARC, NASA Citizen Science, PopShopRadio DRM to Europe, Hackers Disrupt Russian Radio, and Afghan Radio Closures, LRA 36 (Arcangel San Gabriel, Antarctica) Test Broadcast Today at 20:00 UTC. If they are getting interference to a station they would like to listen what station is that, give the call sign. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Right, he's no the public face of it. MR. DOMBROWSKI: Right. Google Maps is a web mapping service developed by Google. March 13 2022 . The Offshore Radio Museum website commemorates many of those pirates. A lot of times you can tell by the audio quality. We have talked about other challenges in densely populated areas just like traffic jams, you're driving around in this van and you can't go anywhere because it's rush hour in New York City. We are not trying to teach you to do something illegal, we are trying to prevent you from doing something illegal, so you can stop your Google search. And I have had to make this clarifying point on other podcasts that I have done at the FCC. Has that happened? The result was a border-blaster that covered a wide geographical area. Some pirates simply key down their mike and begin talking, sharing their political or social views; others offer near-professional music productions, complete with listener feedback, and often acknowledge listener reports with QSLs (radio postcards). You know, is this a massive national problem, are there particular areas where it's a problem? MR. DOMBROWSKI: Yes, to lease some air time off these legitimate stations. Radio GDay came on from Australia occasionally, but no one else. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Probably just workload is another challenge in addition to folks moving the antennas around or taking them down during the day or only operating on weeknights and weekends, as you have said, which forces agents to work overtime. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: We only waited 15 minutes into the episode to get to the fun part so I hope you are listening. Pirate cards are among the most unusual of QSL cards, that often incorporate obscure or vintage imageryhumor, horror, or other graphic oddityor cast the pirate in a unique character representation. They also spent the regulatory fees that they have to, you know, spend I think yearly, and so they have an investment in their service and these unlicensed stations NP that. There is a lot of misconception about what a low power transmitter is. Back in the 1980s, before the Internet and its online bulletin boards, I thought finding pirates was truly a huntrandom and altogether unpredictable. MR. DOMBROWSKI: So we have two ways to file a complaint. The bulk of the pirate radio broadcasters I log transmit just below the 40-meter amateur radio band: anywhere from 6,850 kHz to 6,970 kHz and typically on a frequency spaced at 5 kHz. MR. DOMBROWSKI: Yes, if it's imported. Very old school, and cheap enough for anyone's budget. The original 60s pirate station, playing fresh pop / rock music to Britain's young masses from a boat in the North Sea, floating in international waters four and a half miles off the Essex coastline. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Got you. That would allow us to increase the fine to $100,000. Do you hear it any other time, you know, at night time? Additionally, you can always tune a remote receiver, via the Internet on the Global Tuners website, or via the University of Twentes SDR in the Netherlands. If we can't get in touch with the property owner we try to use a locksmith and if we can't get the locksmith then the door comes breaking down and then we try to secure it before we leave. The frequency spectrum is a natural resource and so all of our decisions that we make when we allocate spectrum is for the public interest. And so these transmitters that they are purchasing and pirate stations are using do not go through the equipment process, the equipment authorization process, and that is a problem. Pirate radio broadcasting on shortwave radio in North America is mostly done in a frequency range just below the 40 meter amateur radio band, from about 6815 kHz to 6970 kHz. VIEWS. Do we have a right under the first amendment to speak via a radio station even if it is unlicensed by the FCC and is there potentially a case that can kind of exemplify why pirate radio is not protected under the First Amendment? It is illegal for companies to market equipment that hasn't gone through what we call a certification process, equipment authorization process, where they get a company to look at their transmitter to make sure it complies with our technical rules and doesn't have potential to cause interference to other radio services. Director Richard Curtis' 2009 comedy-drama stars the late Philip Seymour Hoffman as The Count, a disc jockey for an unlicensed rock radio station that broadcast from a rusty, decrepit ship off the British coast in the mid-1960s, defying government authorities to spin the rock records that weren't allowed on the BBC at the time. * Shows you how to find pirate stations on your AM/FM, shortwave, and online radios. It will also help to have some sort of adjustable bandwidth filter (wide/narrow). Radio Caroline. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: So let's say that either a broadcaster or a listener files a complaint, what happens then, what tools do you, your colleagues in the FCC, have to go about finding a station, shutting it down, bringing people to justice? After the reorganization and modernization of the field I then became the Regional Director and manage several offices now. Across the country, FCC officials are working to identify and take action against unlicensed radio operators that illegally use the frequencies allocated for legitimate radio operators. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: And obviously as a good citizen I have never to my knowledge listened to a pirate radio station. April 8, 2015 - 10:43 am. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Because you don't know what you are running into. Buy me a coffee: https://www.paypal.me/ringwaymanchester Email: ringwaymanchester@mail.com Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/m3hhyofficial Facebook:. To the contrary, though, more than a half-century later, pirate radio is still a thing. Created on. MR. DOMBROWSKI: So this equipment helps us track us down. MR. DOMBROWSKI: Raise it all the way up 100 feet and our director at the time rode up there and got the antenna down. Having that exposure helped boost the careers of scores of British bands whose music eventually made it to America. The reason is, no matter what time of the year it is, no matter what the space weather (yes, I said space weather) or conditions of the ionosphere are--FM stations are relatively few, local, and always broadcast in the same spots on the FM dial. But by the 1960s, the postwar baby boom filled the U.K. with millions of teenagers who were eager to hear the rock 'n' roll records that the BBC declined to play. MR. DOMBROWSKI: Yes, the legitimate one, the licensed station. "The government decided that radio was too influential as a means of mass communication to be in private hands," Peter Moore explains in an email. ACTIVITY. 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