How to play Dead Air
Dead Air is a shortwave signal-hunting and triangulation mystery. Four transmitters are broadcasting across the coastal band between 2000 and 9500 kHz: an automated weather beacon, an offshore telemetry buoy, an authentic vessel in distress, and a rogue spoofer trying to divert the rescue cutter. By tuning your receiver, narrowing the filter bandwidth, and rotating directional loop antennas at two coastal listening posts, you decode each station’s telemetry, triangulate the true MAYDAY sector, and flag the rogue spoofer.
How to play
- Sweep the frequency dial from 2000 kHz to 9500 kHz or use the Station Directory buttons to lock onto each of the four active carrier peaks.
- Switch your filter to Narrow (15 kHz) and rotate the directional loop antenna until the Signal-to-Noise Ratio (SNR) rises above 82 dB to decode clean telemetry.
- Compare the barometric pressure reported by each station against the WX-COAST-1 weather beacon. The rogue spoofer reports an impossible barometer reading and claims a false sector.
- Take bearings from both North Cape Post and South Shoal Post (or press Triangulate on a station) to pinpoint each transmitter’s true physical sector on the 8 by 6 coastal chart.
- Select the Suspect Callsign of the rogue spoofer and the Triangulated Sector of the authentic MAYDAY vessel, then press Transmit Incident Report. You have three attempts.
Tips & strategy
- Check WX-COAST-1 first. Its meteorological bulletin establishes the true storm barometric pressure for the entire coastal sector.
- Narrow bandwidth (15 kHz) cuts broadband static and boosts SNR by up to 16 dB once you are tuned directly onto a station’s carrier frequency.
- Always cross-check claimed sectors against physical bearings. The authentic distress vessel broadcasts from the exact sector it claims, whereas the rogue spoofer’s bearing intersection exposes a different origin.
Accessibility
Every receiver control—including frequency step buttons, filter bandwidth toggles, tower selectors, loop bearing buttons, and station triangulation helpers—is keyboard-operable and screen-reader labelled. Live SNR, carrier lock, and decoded telemetry transcripts are rendered as plain text alongside the spectrum canvas.