RADIO ON THE BIG ISLAND

D. Smith 2026-07-03

I visited the Big Island of Hawaii in May 2026. Radio was not the point (grin!) but I did do bandscans from both the Kona side and the Hilo side. I thought the results might be of some interest…

DXing in Hawaii is different. It is extremely unlikely you’ll hear anything from outside the state (unless listening to AM at night) and if you do hear anything from somewhere else, it’s going to be REALLY GOOD DX! Unfortunately I was unable to listen to AM at night, so I didn’t hear any REALLY GOOD DX. I did hear some interesting things though. I wasn’t able to check TV, beyond watching on cable. One should note there are two Kailuas in Hawaii… The more populous is a Honolulu suburb; the smaller, generally known as “Kailua-Kona”, is on the west coast of the Big Island.

Hilo:

I was only able to listen from the hotel room. Unfortunately that meant distant AM was not possible. On FM, all stations heard were on the eastern side of the island.

Listed translator K220EO 91.9; and LPFMs KDDF-LP 93.5 and KUHH-LP 101.1 were not heard.

On AM, KIPA-1060 was not heard. Its translators K208GK-89.5 and K257GV-99.3 were operating with religious talk. (K208GK has not yet moved to K210FF-89.9) KHLO-850 appeared to be running an open carrier. KPUA-690 is the only fully operating AM station on the Big Island.

Kona:

Listening in Kona was more interesting. I was using the car radio, daytime, in the parking lot for Blue Hawaiian Helicopters on the coast at Waikoloa.

Strong signals were heard from a collection of stations on the western side of the island, and from high elevations on adjacent Maui. Somewhat to my surprise, several Hilo stations made the trip despite the mountains in the middle of the island. (KPUA AM was not heard on the Kona side)

More surprising were signals from many Honolulu/Oahu stations 165 miles away. Specifically, 92.3/95.5/97.5/98.5/99.5/100.3/102.7/105.1 and a tentative on 96.3. I also heard a translator from Maui, 70 miles.

On AM, most Honolulu stations appeared. 590/650/690/760/830/880/990/1040/1210/1420/1500 were all good copy. Closer stations on Maui were strong, and a fair signal was heard from KUAI 570 on Kauai. (265 miles!) KPRP-650 had a dead carrier up for the duration of my trip. It was interesting to encounter Korean and Japanese-language programming!

I had a small shortwave receiver with BFO with me, and tried briefly DXing the ham bands. Didn’t hear anything on SSB or CW, although I didn’t listen very long. There was significant FT8 activity. Wish I’d remembered I had the FT8 software on my phone, I’d have been able to decode some of it…

We enjoyed the trip greatly, and expect to return someday. Maybe next time I’ll be able to sample AM at night from somewhere outdoors – and it would sure be nice to encounter the tropo duct to the mainland!

Bandscans:

Hilo: (All stations licensed to Hilo unless otherwise noted)

Kona: (Maui: 70mi. Kaua’i: 265mi. Oahu: 165mi. Distances approximate.)