"Woodpeckers" Back on Ham Bands

Over-the-horizon radar, whose rat-a-tat sounding signals got them dubbed "woodpeckers" back during the Cold War, appear to be back on the ham bands. Newsline reports that the International Amateur Radio Union's Region 1 Monitoring System has discovered two such systems in operation - one on 80 meters (from 3,555-3,590 kHz and 3,750-3,785 kHz) that it says has been traced to Russia, and another on the 10-meter band that seems to be originating from Iran. The report says the Russian Radio Society has been asked to help deal with the 80-meter interference and that Germany's Department of Post and Telecommunications has sent an official complaint about the 10-meter signals to its counterpart in Iran.