The Pip
en.wikipedia.org
The Pip
1–10 of 26 posts
Re: The Pip
#2Never mind The Pip, The Woodpecker is far more interesting:
Re: The Pip
#3Is there really no readily available technology to find locations of radio stations?
Re: The Pip
#4Is there really no readily available technology to find locations of radio stations?
This confused me too. Unless there are boosters of some kind, the power of a signal seems to follow a pretty predictable decay pattern. You would need to do a sample of the power around a certain radius and find some derivative in that field of where the power is increasing or decreasing the most in proportion to moving across that particular diameter in the circle. Then you've at least established a geodesic line to circumnavigate and hit the station at.
You've also narrowed down the total set of longitudes/latitudes based on the geometry of Russia and with high-confidence, assuming that the station's language can be taken as evidence of anything.
I am not an expert, this is just speculation. But that seems like a reasonable sketch of the problem solving method that would have to be involved.
Re: The Pip
#5Is there really no readily available technology to find locations of radio stations?
There certainly are methods. This is often called "fox hunting" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transmitter_hunting
You can build an antenna with a cardiod pattern, which has a wide range but a very deep, narrow null at one end. When you see the signal strength dip off, the transmitter has to be aligned with the null (sort of, there are also multipath issues to consider)
But, doing this requires you can move freely to track the transmitter. Hunting a transmitter on Russian soil by non-Russian entities might not be viewed very kindly :)
Re: The Pip
#6Never mind The Pip, The Woodpecker is far more interesting: https://vimeo.com/ondemand/therussianwoodpecker https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Russian_Woodpecker
There are lots of things more interesting than The Pip, but they're unrelated. Is there some connection between the Pip and the Russian Woodpecker that I'm missing?
Re: The Pip
#7It makes me think of the series Lost when I read these articles. Alternatively, I feel like its these super isolated bunkers that check in every so often and if they stop doing so, nuclear warheads are launched at the US.
Re: The Pip
#8It makes me think of the series Lost when I read these articles. Alternatively, I feel like its these super isolated bunkers that check in every so often and if they stop doing so, nuclear warheads are launched at the US.
It's easy to think this is something dramatic and mysterious, but it's much more likely that it's actually quite mundane.
Building a dead man's switch that operates over shortwave is a pretty iffy proposition. People might jam you just for fun. You could experience prolonged channel degradation. Also, your transmitter could just plain break. If it were that kind of device, operating continuously since the 1980s, I'd be surprised if it hadn't triggered accidentally already.
Re: The Pip
#9It makes me think of the series Lost when I read these articles. Alternatively, I feel like its these super isolated bunkers that check in every so often and if they stop doing so, nuclear warheads are launched at the US.
It's easy to think this is something dramatic and mysterious, but it's much more likely that it's actually quite mundane. Building a dead man's switch that operates over shortwave is a pretty iffy proposition. People might jam you just for fun. You could experience prolonged channel degradation. Also, your transmitter could just plain break. If it were that kind of device, operating continuously since the 1980s, I'd…
Oh I totally agree- I was more just saying that is what I picture in my mind when I read about these "mysterious" transmissions. Seem like a subplot to a movie.
Re: The Pip
#10If you want to have a listen to the Pip yourself, as well as many others like the squeaky wheel and the buzzer, check out this WebSDR implementation:
http://websdr.ewi.utwente.nl:8901/
and for a much wider list of frequencies of number stations, and radio anomalies you can take a look at:
they have times they broadcast figured out there. if you enjoy this kind of stuff, i suggest picking up an SDR yourself, i know i do. my $20 RTL-SDR works well for playing around with this.