Voice of the Andes in Russian on 11700 kHz: HCJB's Saturday half hour via Nauen

What you hear

A religious programme in Russian, once a week. On Saturdays at 15:30 UTC the frequency opens with the Voice of the Andes identification, Голос Анд, and half an hour follows: Bible readings, a talk or a sermon, Christian songs, sometimes a dramatised story, in a gentle, pastoral tone. At 16:00 UTC the language changes to Chechen for another half hour, which makes this one of the very few places on the dial where Chechen can be heard at all. At 16:30 the slot ends.

Who transmits and why

HCJB is one of the oldest names on shortwave. The station went on the air in Quito, Ecuador, in 1931 as a missionary broadcaster, and for nearly eighty years its transmitters in the Andes sent religious and cultural programmes around the world in dozens of languages under the name Voice of the Andes. The Ecuadorian shortwave site closed in 2009. The organisation continued in other forms, and its German branch produces programmes in German, Russian and other languages and buys airtime for them on commercial transmitters.

This Saturday hour is one of those purchases. The transmitter is at Nauen, west of Berlin, the historic site in use since 1906 and today a commercial relay station, running 125 kW for this broadcast. The pairing of Russian and Chechen in one hour hints at the audience the producers have in mind, Russian speakers and the North Caucasus, though the organisation itself is the authority on its intentions.

When and where to listen

11700 kHz is in the 25 metre band, a daytime band, and 15:30 UTC on a Saturday is late afternoon over the path from Berlin to the Caucasus: the band is open in all seasons, and even in midwinter, when the far end of the path is already in twilight, 25 metres usually holds. Receivers in Russia, Ukraine, the Caucasus and Turkey hear the broadcast as intended. From central Europe the signal is strong, since Nauen is close; from western Europe it is usually good too. The band is busy on Saturday afternoons, so if a neighbour on 11695 or 11705 kHz spills over, a narrower filter or a sideband mode will clean it up. Remember the day: on any day but Saturday the frequency carries someone else or nothing.

In ShackDeck

Station catalogue → Shortwave broadcast → Voice of the Andes in Russian 11700. The program picks a public receiver that covers 11700 kHz, tunes it and sets AM; nothing of your own is needed. NHK's Russian broadcast on 6165 kHz comes from the same Nauen transmitters in the early morning and has its own entry.