"It's not true I had nothing on, I had the radio on" - Marilyn Monroe
A QSL for NDB BRZ Breza, the “sister” beacon of NDB RI Rijeka. This approach and landing beacon is situated on the opposite end of the Rijeka Airport runway in Croatia. As with the other beacons in Istria such as NDB PLA and KAZ for Pula Airport, Mr. Birkić, head of Istria/Kvarner ATC was so kind to confirm my report.
This beacon shows up nicely on Googlemaps, and the funny thing is that is actually situated close to the city of Rijeka, while NDB Rijeka is only close to the airport.
Rijeka Airport in Croatia has two approach and landing NDBs: NDB BRZ Breza to the north west and NDB RI Rijeka to the south east, as can been seen on the excellent Skyvector website.
As with the NDB PLA and KAZ for Pula Airport, Mr. Birkić, head of Istria/Kvarner ATC was so kind to confirm my report.
While the city of Rijeka is situated on the mainland of Croatia, the airport and NDB RI are located on the island Krk.
In addition to NDB PLA Pula I also received the NDB KAV on 265 kHz which is located east of the Pula runway as you can see on this Skyvector picture. Mr. Birkić, head of Istria/Kvarner ATC was so kind to confirm my report.
The quality of my reception was not the best, but the picture below once again shows the power of the Pskov data analysis tool. For a few minutes the signal was OK, then it faded. But the aggregate was still quite strong (although the V was not as prominent as I would like to see).
Receiving a beacon is one thing, I always like spot the location of the beacon using Googlemaps. Well this one is a beauty:
Quite a few people will know Pula as a favorite holiday destination. A 2500 year old city on the tip of the the Istria peninsula, Croatia. And as a holiday destination attracts traffic, Pula has it own airport. And as airports still have NDBs I was able to receive NDB PLA Pula on 351.5 kHz. Mr. Mario Birkić, head of Istria/Kvarner ATC was so kind to confirm my report.
The PLA NDB is not located on the Istria Peninsula though, but on the largest of the Brioni Islands in the Adriatic.
A QSL for NDB VRS Vrsar 369 kHz, Croatia. Unfortunately this beacon has been decommissioned.
In 2023 I sent a reception report to Mr. Mario Birkić, head of Istria/Kvarner ATC for the reception of NDB CRE and NDB KO. In recent years I received 6 additional signals from beacons in the Istria region. One of the beacons I received in 2024 was VRS on 369 kHz:
Mr. Mario Birkić was so kind to confirm my reception of these six beacons. He also mentioned that NDB VRS is decommissioned:
So this is another one that bites the dust. NDB KO on 438 kHz from my QSL request in 2023 isn’t active anymore as well.
The purpose of NDB VRS is not entirely clear to me. Some sources like Our Airports link it to Vrsar Crljenka Airfield (LDPV) a small airport on the Istria Peninsula.
The NBD io group organizes a Co-ordinated LIstening Event (CLE) every month. As a huge fan of something that is a bit of a contest, a bit of a personal challenge, I like these a lot. More importantly they help me to improve my set-up which is why I try to participate most months.
CLE’s always have a certain goal. In CLE299 for example, you had to pick an azimuth and try to receive as much beacons along that line. CLE311 required you had to “build a pyramid”. And CLE309 was all about logging up to 8 stations from each Maidenhead square. In this one, CLE327, the aim was to select 10 frequencies ahead of the event and then log as much beacons as possible.
So the making the right selection was critical. Obviously you do that by checking on which frequency you logged the largest number of different beacons in the past, ideally beacons that you have a fair change of logging again. But I just moved to a new QTH, and worse, I only have a loop pointing 90/270 degrees at my disposal, whereas in the past I switched antenna directions for an optimal result.
But hey… all for the fun of it. In the table below you can see my selection and my results. Now I can only receive these weak signals at my noisy QTH using Pskov, a software tool that basically tries to detect cyclic signals. If it recognizes one, it cuts an SDR recording (I used recordings of an hour) in pieces of exactly that cycle length and stacks them on top of one another to improve S/N ratio. To limit the amount of data processing I listened between 299 and 420 kHz only.
The previous event of a similar nature was CLE306 two years ago when the aim was to log as many NDBs on 8 preselected frequencies. Quite a few NDBs closed down since, so we were allowed to pick 10 frequencies this time. But obviously the CLE306 results provided a good starting point.
As you can see in the table above I managed to log 32 stations in CLE306. Based on my results I made the following selection for the new event:
– Two frequencies, 348 and 330 disappointed me in CLE306 big time. So I excluded them for CLE327.
– Two frequencies, 351 and 410 were not selected in CLE306, but during that event I logged 5 NDBs. So I included them in CLE327.
– And to bring the selection to 10 frequencies I added 316 and 368 as I logged quite a few NDBs on these frequencies in the past.
Again, note that the number of logs in the past are not the only number to go by. Some logs are really rare or once off UNIDs. Some NDBs are located at a larger distances to the north or south, which given high solar activity right now or my limitations with the antenna orientation might provide a difficult catch.
My result in CLE327 was 33 beacons in total. With 3.3 NDBs per frequency quite a bit lower than in CLE306 which resulted in 4 NDBs per frequency. Conditions in that one, which was held in July, were not much better, so I blame my fixed antenna direction for that.
In hindsight, if I had picked the right frequencies, I could have scored 40. So the selection was not too bad. My newly selected 397 let me down with only one log for unknown reasons. Conditions to the Balkan were not bad, as were conditions to the UK and south of France. Maybe I should replace it with 380 next time.
For reference: the average score for participants from Europe was 43, with the top dog scoring 65!
And to finish it off. During the event I received this nice signal from Iran. NDB Uromiyeh, almost 3500 km distance:
A QSL from DFS (Deutsche Flugsicherung) for NDB WSN Weser on 378 kHz. This one was sent with the other QSLs for NDB FS Dresden, NDB NOR Nordholz and NDB MYN Münster.
The function of this beacon is not immediately clear to me. I got no further than: primarily supports air navigation in the Bremen/Hamburg/Bremerhaven region of northern Germany. It is not aligned with any of the runways.
The beacon can be observed from some distance at Google Streetview, south of Holste.
Location NDB WSN Weser (Googlemaps, Streetview)
NDB MYN on 371 kHz, the navigation beacon for Münster Osnabrück International Airport, Germany, was among the 4 old school QSL cards I received after 2 years.
Münster Osnabrück Airport (FMO), traces its origins to 21 December 1966, when the cities of Münster, Osnabrück, and Greven, along with the districts of Münster and Tecklenburg, founded the Münster/Osnabrück Airport GmbH to serve the region’s growing transportation needs.
Construction began in 1968 with assistance from the British Army to clear the site for a runway. After five years of building, the airport officially opened on 27 March 1972, initially handling modest operations with propeller aircraft; the first charter flight followed in 1973.
It gained international airport status in 1986 after runway extensions enabled larger jets like the Boeing 737, paving the way for Mediterranean holiday routes, while a new terminal opened in 1995 and Terminal 2 in 2002 to accommodate rising passenger numbers. Over the decades, FMO evolved into a resilient regional hub, achieving strong post-pandemic growth to exceed 1.25 million passengers annually by the mid-2020s, bolstered by leisure and domestic flights despite occasional setbacks.
I already got a reply from the headquarterss of Mittarfeqarfiit in Nuuk confirming my reception of NDB CP Nerlerit Inaat on 386 kHz. But it so much nicer to get a response from the Airport Manager of Nerlerit Inaat Aiport himself.
Mr. Mandrup was so kind so send me an envelope full of Nerlerit Inaat souvenirs. And I have to admit… visiting Greenland is on my bucket list.
Two years after I sent my report I received a beautiful QSL card from Deutsche Flugsicherung confirming my reception of NDB FS-374 Dresden.
There are still quite a few NDBs operational in Germany, even for large commercial airports like Dresden. NDB FS is located 4.5 miles (7.5 km) NE of Dresden International Airport in line with the runway. Below the Googlemaps images of the location:
Dresden Airport opened to commercial traffic on July 11, 1935. Driven by Germany’s rearmament program after 1933 it served as both a civilian and military airfield. Although initially designed for commercial use, its military significance grew rapidly during the Third Reich, and it served exclusively military purposes during World War II, including supporting an airlift to Breslau in 1945.
After Soviet occupation at the war’s end, the airport remained under military control until extensive reconstruction and negotiations enabled the resumption of civilian operations on June 16, 1957, in the German Democratic Republic. International flights to Eastern Bloc countries restarted in 1959.
Following German reunification in 1990, the airport modernized significantly—with a new terminal in 2001, runway extension in 2007, and rebranding as Dresden International—transforming into a regional hub serving tourism, business, and seasonal destinations.
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