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Polar HF

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FL85300:
Hi! I have some questions regarding HF feeds, to be more precise polar HF. I read a thread from 2014 in which a person
with the username InterpreDemon who broadcasts HF said that the HF feed CAR-A 6577/5550 was able to recieve polar HF
during certain times of the day. The main purpose of the feed as I understand it is to broadcast Caribbean traffic.
I'm not certain if InterpreDemon still modifies the feed from time to time to make it possible to listen to polar HF?
I have been monitoring the feed but I only get Caribbean traffic no matter time of day. Any input would be welcome.

If it is of any help I would be willing to put up an HF feed of my own to increase coverage.
Although i would probably need instructions on how to.

Grateful for answers!

JetScan1:
The two primary Polar frequencies used by Gander are 8891 and 11279. Both frequencies are covered by LiveATC feeds. If conditions are good you should be able to hear polar flights on these radios.

https://www.liveatc.net/search/f.php?freq=8891

https://www.liveatc.net/search/f.php?freq=11279

JS

FL85300:
Thank you for your response!

I have been listening to the frequencies which you listed quite a lot. There is indeed polar traffic on 8891 which is
very interesting.

Caught one polar flight which was told to contact Murmansk after a certain point.
Is there radio silence after that initial contact under normal circumstances until the flight contacts,
in this case Murmansk? Or is there any position reports before that?
I caught some flights going to North America on polar routes, which were told
to contact Edmonton center as their first VHF contact. I suppose the frequency is sent to them via CPDLC.
Would you have any idea of the frequency they use? Is it by any chance covered by LiveAtc?

6628/11279 is a frequency I can't wrap my head around as I mostly seem to be able to get regular
atlantic traffic. Sometimes I get a flight north of Alaska but very rarely.
 Would you know if all flight over Alaska from China and Japan and vice versa use 11279?

There are ARINC facilities in JFK/LGA which give out HF frequencies, but I only seem to hear some Jetblue flights
getting their HF frequencies on there from time to time. Not sure if any polar flights contact any of those frequencies
to get their HF frequencies or not.

It is truly quite incredible the range that HF offers even if its not as widely used these days with the advent of CPDLC.

JetScan1:
FL85300,


--- Quote ---Is there radio silence after that initial contact under normal circumstances until the flight contacts, in this case Murmansk? Or is there any position reports before that?
--- End quote ---

There are position reports required but most of the time they are sent using satellite datalink (ADS/CPDLC). Although satellite coverage in the high Arctic seems to be spotty in some areas and you will on occasion hear flights giving full voice position reports on HF if the datalink is not working.


--- Quote ---I caught some flights going to North America on polar routes, which were told to contact Edmonton center as their first VHF contact. I suppose the frequency is sent to them via CPDLC. Would you have any idea of the frequency they use? Is it by any chance covered by LiveAtc?
--- End quote ---

Some Edmonton Center High Arctic sectors are covered on the LiveATC "CYFB RDO/FIC/Edmonton Ctr" feed. The sector configuration changes throughout the day depending on traffic so you may or may not hear the area you are looking for depending on the route and time of day. Also most of the time you will only hear the controller, unless they turn on the frequency cross-coupling which they don't seem to do very often up there. And as Edmonton is using CPDLC all you will mostly hear is just the initial check in on VHF.

https://www.liveatc.net/search/?icao=yfb


--- Quote ---There are ARINC facilities in JFK/LGA which give out HF frequencies, but I only seem to hear some Jetblue flights getting their HF frequencies on there from time to time. Not sure if any polar flights contact any of those frequencies to get their HF frequencies or not.
--- End quote ---

No you won't hear any polar flights on those JFK/LGA ARINC frequencies. Edmonton (on that LiveATC feed mentioned above) gives out the Gander HF frequencies via CPDLC, although on very rare occasions I have heard them do it using voice. However for some reason for eastbound flights entering Iceland's airspace it is common to hear Edmonton assign the HF frequencies using voice. Iceland usually uses 8864 and 4675 and some on 11279 (8864 is covered on LiveATC).

https://www.liveatc.net/search/f.php?freq=8864


--- Quote ---6628/11279 is a frequency I can't wrap my head around as I mostly seem to be able to get regular atlantic traffic. Sometimes I get a flight north of Alaska but very rarely. Would you know if all flight over Alaska from China and Japan and vice versa use 11279?
--- End quote ---

Gander covers that area north of Alaska and will use either 11279 or 8891 depending on HF conditions. The reception on that LiveATC radio covering 11279 is not very good compared to some of the other ones and I don't know how often it's actually tuned to 11279 ?

FYI You can hear polar flights over northern Alaska within VHF range talking with Anchorage Center on the LiveATC Deadhorse feed. Depending on the route you can hear them get handed off to Gander on 8891 or 11279.

https://www.liveatc.net/search/?icao=pasc

If you didn't know about it already there is a website where you can tune individual HF radios all over the world. Some with very good arctic coverage depending on conditions.

http://www.sdr.hu/

Also info. on polar ops and frequencies here ...

https://www.faa.gov/about/office_org/headquarters_offices/ato/service_units/systemops/ato_intl/documents/Arctic_ATM_Contingency_Plan/Arctic_ATM_Contingency_Plan_1Ed-%202011-12-09.pdf

Let us know what you hear, especially any reports listening to Murmansk, Magadan or Bodo.

JS

Rob K:

--- Quote from: FL85300 on February 09, 2018, 07:22:52 AM ---Thank you for your response!

I have been listening to the frequencies which you listed quite a lot. There is indeed polar traffic on 8891 which is
very interesting.

Caught one polar flight which was told to contact Murmansk after a certain point.
Is there radio silence after that initial contact under normal circumstances until the flight contacts,
in this case Murmansk? Or is there any position reports before that?
I caught some flights going to North America on polar routes, which were told
to contact Edmonton center as their first VHF contact. I suppose the frequency is sent to them via CPDLC.
Would you have any idea of the frequency they use? Is it by any chance covered by LiveAtc?

6628/11279 is a frequency I can't wrap my head around as I mostly seem to be able to get regular
atlantic traffic. Sometimes I get a flight north of Alaska but very rarely.
 Would you know if all flight over Alaska from China and Japan and vice versa use 11279?

There are ARINC facilities in JFK/LGA which give out HF frequencies, but I only seem to hear some Jetblue flights
getting their HF frequencies on there from time to time. Not sure if any polar flights contact any of those frequencies
to get their HF frequencies or not.

It is truly quite incredible the range that HF offers even if its not as widely used these days with the advent of CPDLC.

--- End quote ---

The site owner, Dave, runs one of the 8891 feeds and a HAM friend of mine in Indianapolis runs separate 8891 and 11279 feeds from his remote location in Nova Scotia.

The old days of Cambridge Bay Radio, Churchill Radio and more recently, Arctic Radio are now all but a distant memory and the entire area from roughly 75N to 90N is controlled by Gander Radio these days (ignoring the Edmonton VHF segments).  The problem is that Gander uses 2 or 3 different transmitters and depending on which one they're using at the time dictates whether you'll be able to hear them.  If they're using the transmitter to work the normal NAT traffic then you'll hear the comms but if they're using the others that point in the opposite direction then Gander is often completely inaudible which is highly annoying, but that's how it is.  There used to be another feed for 8891 over in Seattle which due to its location picked up the comms that you couldn't hear from the east coast radios but we don't have that luxury anymore.  Suffice to say that listening to 8891 and 11279 is very much pot luck based on which transmitter is in use and also the propagation to a lesser extent.  This afternoon 11279 was really struggling and I had to change to a UK based SDR to hear the Gander side of the comms.  There's also a little used SDR in Iceland on sdr.hu which sometimes works OK for 11279 through the day but the antenna there isn't fantastic and if often suffers from some nasty interference.

To add to JetScan's comments about Iceland above, it's very unlikely you'll hear Iceland on the 8864, 8891 or 11279 through the daytime because of the distance and propagation.  Iceland uses 8864 as primary through the night time but LATC doesn't cover that freq during those times because there isn't much traffic and it's better deployed on one of the NAT freqs for the eastbound traffic to Europe.  11279 from Nova Scotia runs 0900-2200z iirc.

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