The Russian Woodpecker
For 13 years, a loud tapping noise interrupted radio broadcasts around the world, and nobody would say where it came from.
What was reported
From July 1976, radio listeners and broadcasters around the world began hearing a sharp, repetitive tapping sound, about ten taps a second, cutting across shortwave frequencies. It disrupted radio stations, aircraft communications and amateur radio. Listeners called it the Russian Woodpecker.
It was traced to the Soviet Union, but Soviet authorities said nothing about it, and theories ranged from mind control to weather manipulation.
Explanations offered
It was the Duga radar, a giant Soviet system designed to detect missiles launched from far beyond the horizon. One of its huge antennas stood near Chernobyl, in Ukraine. It stopped in 1989, and its towering frame still stands in the exclusion zone around the Chernobyl power plant.
- When
- 1976 – 1989
- Where
- Chernobyl-2, near Chernobyl, Ukraine
- Witnesses
- Radio users around the world
- Status
- Explained
Famous cases are real, widely reported events. Each file sets out what witnesses said and the explanations that have been offered, without taking a side.