WTIC skywave (Was WBZ & WRKO signal in Springfield)

[Martin Waters]

--- On Tue, 1/26/10, Dan.Strassberg <dan.strassberg@att.net> wrote:
> Remember that WTIC used to stay on ND day pattern until Dallas TX
> sunset (which must be typically 45 minutes after Hartford
> sunset). Now that WTIC switches to night pattern at Hartford >sunset, my guess is that you would have trouble getting it in HD in >Western NY at night, whereas until the after-dark pattern change, >you probably used to get it in HD pretty regularly in Western NY.

    IIRC, the change that occurred lately -- maybe in 08 or 09 ? -- did not change WTIC's operation. Rather, it was a decision of some sort from the FCC that said WTIC is not entitled to protection of its skywave signal while operating non-directional after sunset beyond the skywave contour it would have if it were already operating on its night pattern. I think this involved the FCC approving an application from a small station somewhere in the Midwest?
  
   I don't know whether the FCC gave any reason for, in effect, a decision that contradicts 70 years of its own precedent without a full-scale procedure. Oh, but that's just me . . .

   I suppose it was just being consistent, really, in following on its 40 years of trashing the original I-A and I-B channels in this small, individual case. Because WTIC's license is unique (although KFAB, 1110, Omaha, switching back to non-directional at sunrise at WBT, Charlotte, is a sort of mirror image), this narrow question just probably never was raised until now.