History of Polish coast radio stations (third part)

Problems, problems

Only Polish ships used QRJ services from Gdynia Radio on HF. International calls especially for foreign ships visiting Gdańsk or Gdynia were arranged only on VHF. There were many technical problems involved though.

Jan Kupski remembers: „if a vessel called us on VHF and wanted a QRJ call to perhaps England, we had a lot of trouble regarding international calls. All international calls from Poland at the time were to be connected manually by an operator and had to be booked in advance. Sometimes we had to wait for half a day until the landline connection finally was established. Half a day wasted! Problems with executing international calls on this inefficient telephone system of the whole country were our nightmare. We could compare this work to the way all Western coast stations worked. Most operators of Gdynia Radio had at least a few trips as a radio officer onboard a Polish vessel just to get to know the other side of radio connection. All of us knew how Portishead Radio worked. We were ashamed even more because all the stations could connect us immediately to almost any place we needed. As we come back to Gdynia we were ashamed to the max. We could offer service of similar quality but we needed international calls to be executed at once. It was a problem for the whole country and our worst nightmare. Some years later we got additional VHF channels, two international telephone operators assigned to us and we all learned English. This problem was eventually solved”.

Changes and no money

In the 80s something started, some movements arose. It was the Solidarity. Gdynia Radio has never gone on strike because the station had to provide international maritime communication, also security related. But the martial law that was in force since 13th of November 1981 also applied to people who worked at Gdynia Radio. As international long range communication always has been a risky thing in former Eastern Block, the militia and army garrisoned the station.

Jan Kupski remembers: „In November 1981 I was at sea. I already had a set of prearranged words like unofficial signals shared with my wife. Then I heard one of the words which informed that something wrong is going on. It was 10pm on 12th of November. I asked her what happened, she answered – you know we have some guests here. Then a quick announcement was sent via SITOR radiotelex. So I knew it. When we arrived to Las Palmas in the morning everything was known. There were big pictures, a woman with a burning tank, awful things. It was the toughest time for us, many important decisions were made, a lot of people escaped from the ships to seek political asylum abroad. Anyway I returned to my wife. Every time”.

The long term problems began when our country was broke. In 1982-1983 and later Gdynia Radio didn’t have money for any repairs, they didn’t even have spare lightbulbs. It’s not easy to understand from a Western point of view but in the 80s all negatives of economy of shortage come to whole People’s Republic of Poland. Almost with no exceptions.

Jan Kupski remembers: „in the worst time we had problems with lights, with repairs of antennas and even with some broken windows, with snow getting into via some holes. It was horrible budget problem after the martial law period. We were struggling with technology”.

All the antennas were made of copper wires. They were old and left for years without any substantial refit. Some elements have been broken due to wind. Insulators were made of perspex and became brittle. It took time to get the money, some more time to repair but we did it. A group of engineers lead by chief Stanisław Siczek, one of the best radio engineers in Poland developed new improved antennas. Then a new antenna switch was bought that replaced an old and faulty one made with vacuum tubes. Unfortunately this new switch made of popular BC178 transistors was worse than the previous one because it couldn’t cope with large signals that were coming from antennas of this gain. We had to improve that bad switch. There were no money for the improvement as we did that during very bad economy period of our country. It was bad for almost everyone in Poland these days. Anyway people worked in Gdynia Radio for years. The job was considered stable as antennas of the station (photo below). Unfortunately everything was going to change as whole maritime industry sailed towards new communication technology.

Photo – another view of the antenna field of Gdynia Radio receive station.

Jan Kupski said: „I lived in the Gdynia Radio building, I had a company flat here. We all lived like a large family. Some people even grew cucumbers an other vegetables under the receiving antennas. Whole area was fenced and guarded therefore secure. All children could run all over the area. It was the best part of my life, even if we had very little money. Later we earned some more”.

In the 90s whole Gdynia Radio crew understood that if there wasn’t enough traffic for us then the station would be closed. And there wouldn’t be any job for them. The unemployment ratio was close to 30% and it was a huge problem in the region.

Jan Kupski said: „We had to do our best to get the traffic, we had to collect everything that was in Europe after closure of large coast stations. Almost all of them were about to be closed. St Lys was closed, Scheveningen was closed, Rogaland was closed, Norddeich too. There was nothing left… well, not quite. There was Gdynia Radio. We were still there, ready to answer calls. We had to learn English quickly, we had to improve quality of our international service, we had to check if the vessel is solvable, detect pirates and sign them off. We did it and this strategy paid off handsomely. After improving bad antenna switch we got a flood of traffic during day and night. We had to announce a operator’s break for example for breakfast. All the vessels that still used old technology were calling us. All the time. As the traffic heavily increased we did a lot of good work. If there were golden times for Gdynia Radio, I’d say they were at this particular moment”.

Distress calls

The core of Gdynia Radio was all about maintaining maritime security comunication. It was of course CW on 500kHz, 2182 kHz on phone and later digital on GMDSS systems. During the transition period all operators got full path of GMDSS training, consoles were set up and ready. At the same time old systems on 500kc and 2182 were used. The traffic was becoming lower and lower with every month but distress call could be sent this way. Sometimes they were sent.

The red buttons

On every ship in Poland there was a procedure which required that at least one of the officers (first and third officer preferred) and the captain knew how to send distress call using emergency communication devices. Many Radio Officers had to show the whole procedure many times to make sure that the officers know how to do this. All of the officers at least knew that they can do it and there was a short manual how to send emergency signals by unqualified (i.e. not the Radio Officer) person. A copy of this instruction had to be placed near the radio set. It was included in any manual, also in English (photo below). Note that all switches and knobs had their marks in English. The procedure is straightforward.

instruction plan

Many years before, just after the end of WWII Polish ships used different transmitters and receivers. Most of the oldest vessels used transmitters made by Dansk Radio under Elektromekano brand or Standard Radio ST1200 series. Then a license was bought and WAREL company in Poland developed a Wieloryb class main transmitter (wieloryb – a whale in Polish) based on licensed technology. It was a standard setup (photo below – a Wieloryb transmitter on m/s Pomorze/SPVR) really similar to S-series Elektromekano transmitters. Receivers were different, there were Polish sets (OK102, OMNK2, OMNK111), Russian Volnas, up to REDIFONs. Some vessels used famous Marconi devices. Later during a refit all old radio transmitters and receivers were scrapped and an integrated radio station was installed. It was SSB capable with better overall performance.

Radio room of M/V Pomorze/SPVR, R/O is tuning final stage of Wieloryb main transmitter

Typical Polish radio set of the new era (photo below) was comprised of the main Mewa SSB/CW transmitter in two panels (exciter and final stage amplifier), two EKV receivers (Funkwehr Koepenick, German Democratic Republic) with synthesizer, emergency transmitter NR-2611 for 500kHz (Radmor, Poland), automatic CW distress call decoder AA-1211 with integrated receiver (Radmor, Poland), AKSA or K2211 – automatic distress call keyer (Radmor, Poland), battery charge panel, patch panel, antenna switch and MAK tape recorder. Some stations had also emergency receiver OA-153 for 500kHz band (Radmor, Poland) but it wasn’t necessary as both main receivers could be powered from emergency battery. Radio Officer just set one of them to 500kHz as he left the watch. On many ships one of the EKV receivers was replaced by SAIT, DEBEG, REDIFON or SAILOR receiver. They were better and more reliable in rough conditions at high seas.

This is a radio set that can be seen in Maritime Museum in Gdańsk, placed on museum ship SOŁDEK/SPCJ on lower deck.

Radio Station type MEWA

Jan Kupski said: „I have heard a few distress calls on 500kc also during my voyages. I was sailing on Józef Chełmoński/SQKL during really bad gale on the Bay of Biscay. One vessel lost all power and seeked for help or any assist. We confirmed that call. It ended without any casualties but not every distress call ends well. There was a tragedy of train ferry Jan Heweliusz/SQIK. Very sad thing. It was a dire night, such a bloody storm with 12 Beaufort wind. Or more. We knew at Gdynia Radio that this would be a dangerous night because we had chill weather forecasts. It was about 4 UTC while I was at the 500kHz position. I heard something weak. I didn’t know what is the weak signal about. The only thing I heard were long dashes for direction finding. As the whole sequence of signals was sent, there were long dashes sent afterwards. This signal was so weak that I heard only the long dashes and nothing more. I turned the volume up. If you stay close to the receiver and try to receive a weak signal at louder settings you won’t hear it. You have to step back from the receiver. It’s best to go outside of the room just near the door. All the noise stays in the room and is muffled by the walls especially if you have acoustic panelling as we had. I stood up, went near the door and then heard the signal. I understood that it was from Jan Heweliusz with callsign SQIK, sent from emergency transmitter powered from batteries, connected to reserve antenna and keyed from AKSA – automatic distress call keyer. Somebody has turned on a distress set to send the last message from this vessel. I waited a few minutes for a break and some message but there wasn’t any. This signal lasts forever in my head. I called the rescue service, they already had information from Szczecin Radio. Nobody was answering signals on 500kHz. Later the Kiel Radio or Norrdeich Radio sent a notice that all rescue actions use VHF. I was surprised but maybe they just heard it because they were close enough. It was so sad. I will remember it to the end of my life. Actually it ended in a conclusion based on my own experience that the old 500kc system does not meet the expectations anymore. Digital GMDSS with automatic position information and security announcements just performs better”.

Distress message sent on VHF by captain of the ferry was heard by Ruegen Radio. It was enough to arrange a rescue actions by the station, the rescue operations were really controlled using VHF. Some of the recordings can be found on the Internet. I was told that Jan Heweliusz/SQIK was a really bad luck ship with some malpractice during refits before.

In the transition period all GMDSS consoles needed were installed in Gdynia Radio and Szczecin Radio. But there were some important disadvantages of the new system.

Jan Kupski remembers: „the telecommunication company has spent a lot of money for the GMDSS devices. We had everything we needed for this service. Unfortunately there were false alarms. Somebody just pushed the red buttons, maybe for fun. There were some changed notifications. At the begining of GMDSS era about 90-95% of all received distress signals were false. It was so different from the ruly world of old systems. There were some weird signals on 2182 and some other awfull jokes but I have never heard a false distress signal on 500kHz. Never. Never on CW on 500”.

This is why almost all Radio Officers I’ve been talking to (on phone and CW) told me that 500kHz was a sancticity of maritime radio communications. Right now radio amateurs use a part of this band and CW can be heard there.

If an amateur like me (SP5XMI) wants to send his amateur radio traffic list on historical frequency of Norddeich Radio at 474kHz on 0800 GMT he can.

And so I did. WX information too.

73s,

Marcin Marciniak SP5XMI