August 7, 2006
WESO Tower Downed in Rare "Derecho"
*An unusual weather system with winds that
may have hit 120 miles per hour took down a radio tower in central
MASSACHUSETTS last Wednesday.
WESO (970 Southbridge) lost its 240-foot guyed tower in the
town of Dudley when the "derecho" (a system of downburst
clusters that are part of a heavy windstorm) ripped across southern
New England. The National Weather Service says it was the first
derecho in the region since 1995.
WESO went silent when the tower went down, but returned over
the weekend at low power from a makeshift wire antenna. Chief
engineer Rick Kenadek and engineering consultant Kurt Jackson
were working to get a temporary tower up, and planning to replace
the downed tower, which dated from 1955. Kenedek tells NERW that
the winds loosened one of the tower's guy wires, bringing the
rest of the structure down.
We'll keep you posted as WESO rebuilds.
|
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*On the South Shore, the weekend was devoted to a celebration
of the upcoming centennial of Reginald Aubrey Fessenden's Christmas
Eve 1906 broadcast from Brant Rock in Marshfield.
Saturday's highlights included a live WATD (95.9 Marshfield)
broadcast from the Daniel Webster Estate and Heritage Center,
featuring New England broadcasters past and present, including
WHDH's Fred B. Cole (now 91), station owners Barry Lunderville,
Dennis Jackson and Marshall Sanft, and a telephone hookup with
a parallel Fessenden celebration taking place in Scotland.
A gala party Saturday night was highlighted by the presentation
of the first "Reginald A. Fessenden Broadcasting Award"
to WBZ's Gary LaPierre, and several tables full of his WBZ colleagues
turned out to salute LaPierre for the honor.
We're sorry we couldn't make it to Marshfield - but we're
grateful to NERW correspondent Garrett Wollman for showing up
with his camera and sharing his pictures with us.
*The week's other big story from the Bay State was, of course,
last Monday's announcement that Greater Media, Nassau and Charles
River Broadcasting had finalized the transactions that will give
Nassau the WCRB call letters and classical format and the 99.5
Lowell facility that's now Greater Media's WKLB. The WKLB calls
and country format will move to WCRB's present 102.5 Waltham
facility, and Greater Media will get Nassau's WTHK (97.5 Burlington
NJ), soon to become a full-market Philadelphia move-in.
The sale price of WCRB to Greater Media hasn't yet been disclosed,
but there's reliable word that the Nassau/Greater swap includes
a $20 million cash payment from Greater to Nassau.
In addition to the cash, Nassau will enter the Boston market
for the first time with the WCRB acquisition. On its new 99.5
signal, WCRB's classical format will reach more deeply into southern
New Hampshire (at the expense of coverage in downtown Boston,
on the South Shore and in the western suburbs), linking up with
Nassau's four-station "W-Bach" network on the Maine
coast.
(Most of the programming on the "W-Bach" stations
comes from the World Classical Network, based at WCRB; it's not
clear whether Nassau will end up with the network as well when
the dust settles. Nor has any announcement been made about Charles
River's Cape Cod stations, in a market where Nassau has already
begun to make inroads.)
We'll get to the WTHK piece of the deal later in this week's
column.
 *One
more piece of big news came from Entercom's WAAF (107.3 Westborough),
where afternoon jock Mistress Carrie has, through the miracle
of Webcasting, become one of the most popular radio personalities
among the U.S. troops in Iraq and Kuwait.
\In September, Carrie will travel to the Middle East to spend
12 days embedded with the Massachusetts Air National Guard there,
broadcasting back to Boston several times daily via satellite
phone. She's currently soliciting phone cards from listeners
to take to the troops - along with loads of WAAF goodies.
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*In NEW HAMPSHIRE, we hear that director
of engineering John Huntley will be leaving New Hampshire Public
Radio on September 1, heading to Illinois as his wife takes a
new job out there. In his years at NHPR, Huntley's overseen a
huge expansion of the statewide network's reach, including brand-new
signals in Nashua and Jackson, and he'll leave some pretty big
shoes behind as he departs the Granite State.
 *The
big story in NEW YORK last week was Air America's announcement
that it will change flagship stations at the end of August, when
its current lease with Inner City Broadcasting's WLIB (1190)
expires.
Beginning September 1, most Air America programming will instead
air on Access.1's WWRL (1600), displacing a daytime lineup there
that currently includes leased-time health shows (10 AM-3 PM)
and several syndicated talkers. WWRL's current morning show,
featuring Sam Greenfield and Armstrong Williams, will remain
in place, as will its weekend Caribbean music programming and,
likely, its carriage of the late-night Alan Colmes show.
So what will be heard on WLIB come September? Inner City's
not saying yet, but the rumors are very strong that the station
will end up with a non-Air America lineup of other progressive
talkers, likely with the involvement of former Clear Channel
Radio boss Randy Michaels.
Down the dial at WOR (710), Tyler Florence gave his resignation
from the station's food show, becoming the third host in two
years to leave the show (Rocco DiSpirito left in late 2005, a
year after longtime host Arthur Schwartz quit.)
 *Upstate,
the Rochester broadcast community is mourning longtime WOKR (Channel
13) meteorologist Bill Peterson, who died Saturday (Aug. 5) at
58 after a long, public struggle with cancer, lung disease and
heart disease.
Peterson came to Rochester in 1982 from his native Wisconsin
and never left channel 13, becoming the station's chief meteorologist,
a post he held until his health problems forced him to retire
in 2001.
Even after he retired, Peterson's health was still the subject
of regular updates on channel 13 (now WHAM-TV), and the station
devoted much of its weekend newscasts to sharing memories of
Peterson from staff and viewers. Not many broadcasters merit
that level of coverage, but it's a tribute to the connection
that Peterson forged with the community that it didn't seem a
bit out of place. (The station's Monday 6 PM newscast will also
be dedicated to Peterson.)
Meanwhile, across town at third-rated WROC-TV (Channel 8),
the concept of staff longevity took a few more hits last week.
Reporter/anchor Ty Chandler (one of several staffers who came
over when WROC took over operation of Fox affiliate WUHF) is
the latest to depart the struggling station.
The cutbacks at Westwood One are taking a toll on Metro Networks'
upstate operations: at month's end, Metro will close down its
Rochester operation. We hear operations in Syracuse and Albany
are being cut back as well, with a number of talented people
being put out of work as a result. (Will this be Clear Channel
Traffic's cue to enter the Rochester market?)
Elmira's dean of TV news is retiring next week, closing out
a 40-year career at what's now WETM (Channel 18). Carl Proper
came to the station, then WSYE-TV, in 1966 and now anchors the
5 and 6 PM newscasts there. WETM will honor him with a special
during his final newscast August 17, and 11 PM anchor Jeff Stone
will take over the 6 PM newscast. (Matt Molloy will do the 5.)
 *In
western PENNSYLVANIA, the format didn't change at Connoisseur
Media's WUSE (93.9 Fairview), but just about everything else
at the Erie-market country station did. As of last Monday, "US
93.9" has given way to "The Wolf," with new calls
WTWF. The station's airstaff is expected to remain in place,
though it's running jockless right now.
At sister station WRTS (103.7 Erie), night jock Dave Mazur
is on his way to Toledo, taking the night gig at WVKS (92.5)
that was vacated when Brian "Munchie" Donovan moved
to Hartford and WKSS.
In Pittsburgh, the brokered-time "Locker Room" morning
show on WBGG (970) is history, replaced by Fox Sports Radio network
talk for now. Down the street at WAMO-FM (106.7 Beaver Falls),
DJ Boogie gets promoted from assistant PD to PD, retaining his
afternoon on-air shift as well.
After losing his longtime gig as the Pittsburgh Penguins'
TV play-by-play voice, Mike Lange will move to the team's radio
booth this fall. He signed a one-year deal with the team to handle
the radio broadcasts, which will be heard on WBGG and on WXDX
(105.9), a move from last year's broadcasts on WBGG and WWSW
(94.5). (Clear Channel, which owns all three stations, is negotiating
with the Pirates to take over their broadcasts next year as well;
if the games do move from CBS Radio's KDKA, they're likely to
land on some combination of WWSW and FM talker WPGB.)
On the Maryland border, Verstandig's WPPT (92.1 Mercersburg)
has flipped from top 40 ("The Pulse") to classic country.
There's a new local morning show at Greater Media's WPEN (950
Philadelphia), featuring new PD Gregg Henson and former Jets/Seahawks
quarterback Glenn Foley, along with producer Michael Checkoway.
And what about the 97.5 move-in that Greater's getting in
Philadelphia? We're hearing all sorts of interesting rumors about
the future of the signal, which will reach the full market from
the WJJZ (106.1) tower in Wyndmoor, just north of the Philly
city line - but the most persuasive ones have to do with some
sort of FM talk. (And as for WJJZ - is a format shift on the
way there, too?)
*Just a few bits of news from CANADA
this week: Blackburn Radio is asking the CRTC to let it change
the frequency of its Windsor relay of CKUE (95.1 Chatham). It
seems that the high-powered synchronous operation at Windsor
(currently running 1950 watts on 95.1) is causing interference
to the main Chatham signal along Highway 401 and receiving interference
from co-channel WFBE in Flint, Michigan - so Blackburn wants
to move the Windsor CKUE-FM-1 signal to 100.7, where it would
run 9 kW DA/74.5 meters, with an improved signal into Detroit
as well.
And in Ottawa, the FM dial just keeps filling up: Aboriginal
Voices Radio is testing its new signal at 95.7, while the new
CIIO (104.7) is on the air testing with tourist information as
"InfoRadio Canada."
|
From
the NERW Archives
(Yup, we've been doing this a long time now, and
so we're digging back into the vaults for a look at what NERW
was covering one, five and ten years ago this week, or thereabouts
- the column appeared on an erratic schedule in its earliest
years as "New England Radio Watch," and didn't go to
a regular weekly schedule until 1997. Thanks to LARadio.com
for the idea - and thanks to you, our readers, for the support
that's made all these years of NERW possible!)
August 8, 2005 -
- After just three weeks on the air, veteran MAINE morning
man Mark Persky is already gone from Nassau's "Frank"
(WFNK 107.5 Lewiston). No details yet on the hasty exit...stay
tuned!
- After a dozen years at Boston's WBZ (1030), morning reporter
Flo Jonic is out of work this week, sparking a controversy over
potential government intrusion into the newsgathering process
along the way. As both of Boston's big papers have reported,
Jonic was fired by WBZ management after sending an e-mail to
other newsroom staffers criticizing what she said was a decision
to shelve a story she had done on lax security at the FBI offices
in downtown Boston. That's about as much as all sides agree on,
though. Jonic says she was fired for opposing the decision to
keep the story off the air (which she says was prompted by a
phone call to management from the FBI). WBZ managers say Jonic
was fired for insubordination, for sending the e-mail to the
entire newsroom. They contend that the story was being readied
for promotion during the fall ratings period.
- Diane Sutter's making big plans for her new TV station, WNDS
(Channel 50) in Derry, NEW HAMPSHIRE. After 22 years as "The
WiNDS of New England," the independent station serving the
Boston market will change calls to WZMY when Sutter's Shooting
Star relaunches its operations this fall. Those calls stand for
"MyTV," and the Nashua Telegraph reports that Sutter's
plans include a nightly talk show called "My TV Prime"
and a rebranded newscast, "My TV Now." (And yes, never
fear, the station's signature personality, weatherman Al Kaprielian,
will still be a part of the broadcasts.)
- NEW JERSEY's newest FM station will be around for a while,
after all. The FCC has granted a full five-year experimental
license to WA2XMN, the experimental station on 42.8 MHz at the
Armstrong Tower in Alpine. Steve Hemphill, the Philadelphia engineer
who came up with the idea to revive the old FM band and who built
the WA2XMN Phasitron transmitter, says the plan now is to try
to recreate Armstrong's networking experiments from Alpine to
various New England mountaintops, beginning with Mt. Asnebumskit
in Paxton, Mass.
August 13, 2001 -
- The big news in NEW YORK came as no surprise, really; everyone
in the business knew that ABC wanted WEVD (1050 New York) as
the Big Apple flagship for ESPN Radio. Now we know the price
and the terms under which control of WEVD will pass from the
Forward Association to the Disney gang. ESPN programming will
begin full-time on 1050 September 1, under an LMA that gives
Disney the option to begin negotiations for a $78 million purchase
of the 50,000 watt station any time in the next two years.
- Forward officials say their goal is to return to a focus
on their print offerings (the weekly Forward), using the money
from WEVD to support the struggling newspaper. The Forward Association
reportedly wants to become a non-profit, according to the "Save
WEVD" folks who have been fighting for months to keep the
present quirky talk lineup in place on 1050.
- So what about those call letters? It's a safe bet that labor
leader Eugene Victor Debs wasn't an Islanders fan, so we'd expect
a possible change (though Disney never did flip its Radio Disney
outlet on 1560 from the old "WQEW"). M Street beat
us to the punch in noting that the logical "WSPN" is
in use on FM up in Saratoga Springs, at Skidmore College's 91.1.
- Elsewhere in NEW YORK, there are some unhappy listeners and
viewers in the public broadcasting arena, thanks to a pair of
decisions to merge operations in the New York City area.
- On the TV side, the board of directors at WLIW (Channel 21)
on Long Island voted last week to approve a merger with Newark,
N.J.-licensed WNET (Channel 13). By joining forces with the bigger
WNET operation, WLIW officials say, they can avoid the massive
financial burden of the upcoming DTV conversion. Long Island
viewers say they're worried about losing the distinctive programming
(in particular, British comedies) that WLIW has long offered.
WLIW board member Anne Ellis resigned before the vote on the
merger, and lawmakers are being asked to examine the deal.
- On the radio side, program producers and listeners of WNYE
(91.5 New York) are launching their own last-ditch effort to
keep the city's Board of Education from handing operations over
to the WNYC public radio folks. We've seen the e-mail petition
they're circulating, and while we know the "Save WNYE"
crew means well, a word of advice: your letters to the school
chancellor would be better received if you call him "Harold"
Levy and not "Howard"...
- A few more bits of news from the city: John Fullam has resigned
as general manager of Clear Channel's WHTZ (100.3 Newark) and
senior VP for regional operations for Clear Channel. No replacement
has been named. Fordham University's WFUV has been denied, again,
in its attempts to put an on-channel booster for its 90.7 signal
in Manhattan. And on the TV side, there's finally more DTV action:
WPIX-DT 33 had its license to cover granted this week, while
WNET-DT 61 is right behind.
New England Radio Watch, August 1/9, 1996
- That loud sucking sound you're hearing
near Boston's Copley Square is coming from the American Radio
Systems headquarters, as ARS keeps buying and buying and buying.
Within the last few weeks, ARS has spent about $67 million buying
KXOA-AM-FM/KQPT-FM Sacramento, KRBT-FM/KNAX-FM Fresno, and KOQO-AM/FM
Fresno. Now ARS has turned its attention back to home, spending
a reported $24.9 million to buy WAAF (107.3)/WWTM (1440) from
Zapis.
- WAAF targets the Boston market with
a hard-rock format, serving a small niche, but one that it has
all to itself. WWTM is all sports, with a signal that doesn't
reach anywhere east of Worcester County very well. They join
ARS' existing stable of stations: WRKO (680), its flagship talker;
WEEI (850), which is all sports; WEGQ (93.7), the Lawrence-licensed
70s outlet; and WBMX (98.5), the hot AC "Mix 98.5."
- WRCZ (101.7) in Pittsfield MA has returned
to its original calls of WBRK-FM, and is using ABC's syndicated
AC "Star" format as "Star 101.7." "FMedia!"
reports "Z101" was the lowest-rated FM in Berkshire
County.
- After about 2 years as morning host
of Boston's WMJX "Magic 106.7," Gary Dickson is headed
off to Houston's oldies KLDE (94.5). The move brings Dickson
back to his old employer, Entercom, for whom he had worked in
Pittsburgh before coming to Boston as Tom Bergeron's replacement
on Magic. Mike Addams moves across the hall from WMJX's sister
station WBCS "Country 96.9" to handle morning duties
on Magic, and Addams' former co-host, Tom Doyle, will keep things
going on WBCS while Greater Media figures out how it's going
to drop country from either WBCS or newly-purchased WKLB (105.7),
probably within a month.
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*Didn't find a Tower Site Calendar
2006 under the tree/menorah/Blaw-Knox diamond tower model
of your choice over the holidays? Our supply is running low,
but we have a few still available at special clearance
prices!
 We've got to say,
we're especially proud of the way this year's calendar turned
out. Once again, we bring you more than a dozen images from the
fybush.com collection that have never seen print before, including
that nifty nighttime view of New York's WMCA that graces the
cover. You also get to see WSB, KTAR, Mount Wilson, CBV and many,
many more, plus all those fun dates in radio and TV history,
civil and religious holidays, a handy full-page 2007 calendar,
and the always-popular hole for hanging.
And we do it all with no increase in price, for the fourth
year running!
You can get one free with your 2006 subscription
to NERW at the $60 level, or order the calendar (plus other goodies)
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Store! We think you'll like this one - and as always,
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2006 by Scott Fybush. |
