KHEI/KAOI Kihei HI – 1110 kHz

QSL from Kihei-1110 kHz after 30 years!

Norwegian Dxer Geir Stokkeland was working on Norwegian outposts in the Arctic for several Winter seasons in the 80s and was actively dxing hearing many excellent stations both from North America, as well as Asia and the Pacific.

He may be one of the first who picked up Kihei, Hawaii on 1110 then broadcasting with the KHEI callsign. The station was noted on Hopen Island on October 6th, 1984 at 1341Z with the slogan «Ki Hey» and MoR music.

When on Bear Island Geir also logged KHEI at 1036Z, on March 19th, 1986. But half a year later the KHEI signal made it to the rectory in the fishing village of Bud on mainland Norway where I was Parish Priest in the 80s.

That was on the great Alaska and Hawaii day October 18th, 1986 and the time 0930Z. Even if I employed a 600 meters Beverage antenna to the North and the excellent Hammarlund SP600 JX1, Stefan Wikander’s preselector was a great aid, lifting the signal up to QSA 3-4. I heard a male voice promoting a forthcoming show as well as call letters for AM(KHEI) and for FM.(KVIB) Geir had success with his report which was answered by the then boss, Rod W in September 1986. I also reported, but had no success with Glen Z at Orchid Isle Electronics, who I had read in the dxpress did station engineering. — Almost 30 years on, and I was happy to have been able to take up contact with Rod on Messenger. I sent him the KHEI/KVID recording, and he recognized the station!

Since 2015 and until this spring I was able to do dxing again on Bjarne’s KONG and Arctic SDRs.

Here, Pacific stations are heard often, and on 1110, what is now KAOI is often heard, together with KAGV in Alaska. Also here I was unsuccessful in reporting at the start, but Finnish dxer Jyrki Hytönen helped, and I found CE Ron. I sent him a report of my reception of KAOI 1110 AM on February 17th,2020 at 1231Z containing end of CBS News update, plus 230 secs promos and 11 min.station promo. After this the station went back to Coast to Coast AM. This local ID phrase was featured: "KAOI 1110 AM…» and "KAOI 1110 AM and on your FM dial 96.7 FM, 98.7 and 96,5 FM Westside.» After 1 day I got this nice reply:

"Greetings Svenn, I am happy to confirm your reception of KAOI. The clip is quite clear and very definitely KAOI 1110 kHz. KAOI transmits to a 198 foot vertical antenna with a power of 5000 watts. That antenna is shared with KEWE 1240 kHz. Good DX to you and Aloha from Maui. Ron Middag, Chief Engineer, KAOI Radio Group, KH6CVJ"

Let me add that KAOI/KEWE broadcasts from the Haiku ditch area and is owned by VISIONARY RELATED ENTERTAINMENT 11, INC. KUAU 1570, KCIK 740 and KMVI 900 come from a nearby common site but a different one to KAOI/KEWE. Still on Maui, KNUI 550 transmits from a unique site from the northern part of the Island. I also refer to my recent ARC essay: Molokai Revisited. http://kaoi1110.com/ https://www.facebook.com/…/KAOI-Radio-Group-KAOI-Q103-KDLX…/ http://www.stellamaris.no/geirmasterpubl.pdf http://stellamaris.no/khlo.htm

1110 KAOI KHEI 1240 KEWE TX SITE HAIKU DITCH(Google Maps)