How much longer will WBZ stay at 1170 SFR?

[Dan.Strassberg]

Well, wasn't one of those times during the blizzard of '78--clearly a
time when the signal was needed most! Allston was there as the backup
and WBZ remained on the air. Today, I suppose, in a similar emergency,
WBZ could pre-empt the sports on 98.5, but under emergency conditions,
what would be the impact of having no signal on the frequency on which
the entire region has for more than 3/4 of a century depended for news
and public-safety announcements? Ater the fact, CBS could, of course,
allay some of the negative publicity by touting the fact that the
emergency was an act of God, but at least a few of us would know that
the company, with all of its resources, failed to adequately plan for
the emergency.

As for having an emegency auxilliary site at a site owned by a
competing broadcasting company, there must be many such situations in
US radio. Even though US broadcasting companies have a long tradition
of intense competition, they also have an equally long tradition of
helping each other out in times of emergency--especially when the
public welfare is in jeopardy. Entercom made quite a name for itself
in the wake of Hurricane Katrina as the operator of New Orleans' only
Class A AM, WWL. No doubt, if WBZ were off the air from Hull and had
to use an auxiliary at Entercom's Needham site, Entercom would want
(and I believe, would receive) all of the good publicity they could
get out of their public-spirited role (for which, lets not forget, CBS
would be paying handsomely--in the form of rent every month).

And speaking of situations in which the public welfare could be in
jeopardy, suppose we had to deal with FukuShima New England. What are
the distances of Hull and Needham from Plymouth? If Hull and Allston
were in the evacuation zone and Needham were not, I could see WBZ,
WBZ-FM, WEEI and WRKO all broadcasting from improvised emergency
mobile studios at the WEEI Tx site, or maybe even the WRKO site. Even
maybe from the WVEI studios in Worcester--if, indeed, such studios
exist.

-----
Dan Strassberg (dan.strassberg@att.net)
eFax 1-707-215-6367

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Scott Fybush" <scott@fybush.com>
To: "Dan.Strassberg" <dan.strassberg@att.net>; "(newsgroup)
Boston-Radio-Interest" <boston-radio-interest@bostonradio.org>
Sent: Monday, June 13, 2011 11:27 PM
Subject: Re: How much longer will WBZ stay at 1170 SFR?


>
> I don't think the flooding problem at Hull is so serious as to
> render it unusable as an aux site. How often have the elevated tower
> bases gone under water in the 71 years the site's been in use?
>
> s