The mysterious and sometimes eerie number stations have been on the airwaves for many years now and even now they never fail to generate interest. The majority broadcast streams of numbers, words, letters and Morse code which are usually read by a woman. The general theory is that they were used to send coded messages to spies during the Cold War era but it appears over time, stations have come and gone implying that they are still in use today broadcasting their cryptic messages to a secret select few.

I always fire up the short wave radio in the hope of finding one and I think I did today for the first time. Click here to listen to it, the number station can be heard about 30 seconds in.

My favourite one which I have heard recordings of many times is one containing the chimes of Big Ben. This brodcast has been repeatedly going out for some years now as the tape used has obviously become warped as a result of its heavy usage and now if you’re fortunate enough to listen to it today, you’ll hear that the chimes are rather odd sounding. I like to think the tape player is being transmitted from an old forgotten bunker somewhere, always on constant loop.