WHRI Starts Frequency War With CHU

Listeners to the 40 meter band might have noticed that World Harvest Radio has added 7335 kHz to its frequency schedule between the hours of 0600 and 1100 UTC (2 to 7 AM in the Eastern time zone). This is part of its "Angel 1" schedule, beaming toward South America from Cypress Creek, SC with a claimed effective radiated power in the tens of megawatts. (All this is fully documented on their web site.)

Even though the beam is southward, this has been pretty well obliterating CHU, the Canadian standard time and frequency station near Ottawa. Many people actually use CHU for the same purposes as WWV/WWVH/WWVB in the USA, including sensitive automated timing applications. Needless to say, they are somewhat less than thrilled.

Unfortunately, under the new ITU international allocations that took effect two months ago, CHU is technically a broadcaster, not a utility, and does not have any kind of priority on the frequency the way it would if it were still operating as a government service. It's a legal technicality, but one being exploited quite effectively by WHRI.

While WHRI does have a legal right to transmit here, IMHO it's pretty tacky. Even HAARP listens first.

Here's the e-mail sent by someone at CHU in reply to correspondence from the Ontario DX Association:

Hello Brian,

I am aware of this situation.

CHU has a licence to broadcast on 7.335 MHz and this frequency has been
registered with ITU, HFCC, FCC and other broadcast authorities. This,
however, does not guaranty that we own this frequency, for all international
purposes. We must now fight for it, with the FCC.

I have sent several letters to WHRI, but their chief engineer has not
replied to me. I have also sent a letter to the FCC stating the use of our
service on this band and our long standing service at this frequency. They
have yet to respond.

We must now go through all politically correct channels to resolve this
dispute. But the members of your association can use other mean declare
their dissatisfaction with the interference from WHR. Have your interested
members send email to WHR ( lsarkisian@lesea.com ), and the FCC (
thomas.lucey@fcc.gov ).

This may have more impact.

Regards,
Raymond Pelletier
============================================
Frequency and Time
Institute for National Measurement Standards
National Research Council Canada
M-36, room 1026
1200 Montreal Road
Ottawa, Canada K1A 0R6
Tel: (613) 993-3430
Fax: (613) 952-1394
raymond.pelletier@nrc-cnrc.gc.ca
Government of Canada
========================================
Fréquence et temps
Institut des étalons nationaux de mesure
Conseil national de recherches Canada
M-36, salle 1026
1200 chemin Montréal
Ottawa, Canada K1A 0R6
Tél: (613) 993-3430
Télécopieur: (613) 952-1394
raymond.pelletier@nrc-cnrc.gc.ca
Gouvernment du Canada
========================================

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