[Spooks] Strange signal on the 40 meter band at 7035.50 kHz

[Curt Rowlett]

Hello Group:

I was transmitting Digital SSTV on the 40 meter band last Saturday morning
when I spotted a strange signal in the waterfall of the Web SDR that I was
running on my Chrome browser (I always keep an SDR open as I'm transmitting
as I like to watch the images appear on the waterfall as I am sending
them).

I'm not sure if I was tuned to the proper frequency or not, and I tried
both USB and LSB. I suspect that this is likely someone doing a radio test
of some kind. Tuned via the Web SDR located in Newport, Oregon, USA.

Video of the signal here: https://youtu.be/rxTn0P8lsrA

As can be seen on the UTC widget running at the top right of the video
screen, I first noticed this signal at approximately 1715 UTC, Saturday,
December 15, 2018.

I've posted about this video on the HF Underground website under the
section for "HF Mystery Signals" which can be read here:
https://www.hfunderground.com/board/index.php/topic,48985.0.html

So far, I've had others try to guess what this signal is. I originally
thought that it was someone else sending out Digital SSTV waterfall images,
but after tuning to the signal, I quickly realized that was not the case.
So far, others have suggested RFI from some source, such as a home
appliance (washing machine) to some sort of timer set for a mechanical pump
to the Feld Hell digital mode (which I don't believe is the case) to
something possibly like the HAARP transmissions.

I personally suspect that this was likely some sort of test being run by a
radio amateur. I base my opinion on the fact that the signal was located in
the area set aside on the 40m amateur band for the United States,
specifically for sending/receiving digital modes of all types.  The signal
only transmitted for the length of time of up to and over 10 minutes in the
video that I recorded. I monitored the signal for the rest of the day and
it only transmitted sporadically after that, and then only five or six
cycles of the signal were sent (timing them you can see that each cycle is
a roughly six second transmission with a pause of about two seconds
between) and then it would stop again, often for hours. It did, however,
continue to sporadically transmit for the rest of the day and evening.

Also, at one point during the day on Saturday, I opened up three separate
Web SDRs, all tuned to the same signal. One SDR was located in  Newport,
Oregon, USA (the SDR on which I originally spotted the signal and which is
the one you see in the video), another was in Weiser, Idaho, and the third
was in Sunnyvale, California. When the strange signal began transmitting
again on the Oregon SDR, I noticed that the signal was *not* appearing on
the other two SDRs. Not the greatest feat of triangulation, but it did lead
me to believe that the signal was likely originating in or very close to
the State of Oregon.

This may be nothing but a one-off anomaly of some sort. But this video has
generated a lot of interest on my YouTube channel and I wanted to ask you
pros what your opinions are.

Thanks and Happy Holidays to all,

Curt Rowlett / W9SPY
Seattle, Washington USA
http://labyrinth13.com