Guess What I Heard This Afternoon

[The-Major]

This afternoon at around 3 PM while driving home from work aqui en Homestead my favourite radio station - 91.7-CALL-FM - went off-the-air again (for the umpteenth time over the past few months). So I switched around to various preprogrammed stations / frequencies on my car stereo. WILD-95.5 (110+ miles away) was coming in surprisingly strong with little static, 97.9-WRMF (75+ miles away) was fading in and out with much static, 107.1-WA1A (185+ miles away near Melbourne) was fading in and out and barely audible (but I could still recognize various hit songs), and WEOW-92.7 (85+ miles away near Key West) was coming in rather nicely (although it too faded out occasionally).

THE MAJOR

 

[bat manny]

i think its the weather or the ionsphere/atmosphere that somehow bounces signals father than what they are intended i read up on that somewhere. Ive noticed that too some periods of the year are great for DX'ing also during or after storms.
a few years back i picked up 93.3 wflz out of Tampa in my portable boom box in my room without an external antenna it was also winter and kinda stormy, though 933 was so strong that it was comming in clearer on 93.5 becouse we have a local 93.1 here and it blots out 93.3 with bleed ins

 

[callfm]

Hey Major, sorry about the technical problem. Our TX site got hammered yesterday and it affected an audio switching device yesterday so we lost audio for a few minutes.

The CALL (WMKL) has had several DX reception reports due to tropospheric ducting - we have two letters from more than 1,000 miles away, Ohio and New York. Unfortunately it works both ways and we've had some instances where we've heard stations, in clear stereo, from Michigan and another state farther to the west bouncing into Miami-Dade. If you hear it on one channel sometimes you can find distant stations on other channels too. I have a friend that can even pick up the RDS signals from distant stations (i.e., Texas) which is pretty amazing.

Rob/CALL FM

 

[jcolletta275]

Unfortunately it works both ways and we've had some instances where we've heard stations, in clear stereo, from Michigan[...]

Hey Rob, just curious (since I currently live in Michigan)... W219CA, WCML, WMCQ or WUOM?

 

[The-Major]

a few years back i picked up 93.3 wflz out of Tampa in my portable boom box in my room without an external antenna it was also winter and kinda stormy, though 933 was so strong that it was comming in clearer on 93.5 becouse we have a local 93.1 here and it blots out 93.3 with bleed ins

93.3-FLZ (Tampa) is actually rather notorious where I live for screaming its powerful blowtorch of a signal counter-clockwise right through the swamps of the Everglades and into the heart of Homestead real early in the morning before dawn. This is usually at least a weekly event. MIX-100.7 (Tampa) does the same thing (less frequently than 93.3-FLZ) when it actually cancels out Y-100 !

I've had mornings when it was not 'Y' on my radio but 'MIX' instead, and since I didn't really care for the music on 'MIX' I switched over to 93.3 to find 'FLZ' broadcasting loud and proud as if it were a local station beaming from the nearby WTVJ NBC-6 tower !

THE MAJOR

 

[callfm]

We've heard WUOM from Ann Arbor a couple of times. Strong enough to override WMKL where it should have had 54 dBu reception (Cutler Ridge at the time). Since co-channel interference begins when the interfering signal is 20 dB above the protected signal (according to the FCC rules), one would think the received WUOM signal exceeded 74 dBu at that time and location.

Rob/CALL FM

Unfortunately it works both ways and we've had some instances where we've heard stations, in clear stereo, from Michigan[...]

Hey Rob, just curious (since I currently live in Michigan)... W219CA, WCML, WMCQ or WUOM?

 

[jcolletta275]

Phew! And I've had troubles picking 'UOM up just 70 miles away! ;D Thanks for the info!

 

[livingfruitvirus]

a few years back i picked up 93.3 wflz out of Tampa in my portable boom box in my room without an external antenna it was also winter and kinda stormy, though 933 was so strong that it was comming in clearer on 93.5 becouse we have a local 93.1 here and it blots out 93.3 with bleed ins

93.3-FLZ (Tampa) is actually rather notorious where I live for screaming its powerful blowtorch of a signal counter-clockwise right through the swamps of the Everglades and into the heart of Homestead real early in the morning before dawn. This is usually at least a weekly event. MIX-100.7 (Tampa) does the same thing (less frequently than 93.3-FLZ) when it actually cancels out Y-100 !

I've had mornings when it was not 'Y' on my radio but 'MIX' instead, and since I didn't really care for the music on 'MIX' I switched over to 93.3 to find 'FLZ' broadcasting loud and proud as if it were a local station beaming from the nearby WTVJ NBC-6 tower !

THE MAJOR

That sounds like something the FCC should hear about.

 

[The-Major]

That sounds like something the FCC should hear about.

I don't think that the FCC is interested in hearing about how a Tampa Bay area 100,000 watt commercial FM station is overriding a Miami-Dade / Broward County Line area 100,000 watt commercial FM station on certain early mornings way down here in the Miami exurbs of Homestead. That's caused by our atmosphere (and all of the various 'spheres). Besides the Tampa Bay area gets bombarded by Panama City area stations on apparently the same mornings, so it's sort of like a chain-effect scenario.

The FCC should be more interested about the [alleged] pirate station that occasionally broadcasts reggae music in southern Broward County between I-75 and the Turnpike at the same exact frequency as CALL-FM. When that station is on you will suddenly lose your CALL-FM (if you're a listener) pretty much as soon as you cross into Broward County on I-75 northbound from the Turnpike. You will get your CALL-FM back deep into Broward (as you approach the I-75 westbound / I-595 eastbound junction).

THE MAJOR

 

[callfm]

On the pirate issue, we stood accross the street from a pirate station in Hollywood 2-3 weeks ago, in plain view with the Hollywood Police Department showing them the off-the-scale reading on our field strength meter and pointing at the 2-bay antenna on top of the building. We must have scared somebody who saw us from inside the building because the full-time pirate station ceased operation within 24 hours. The FCC and FDLE, along with the Hollywood PD were ready to take this one down.

CALL FM/Rob

 

[The-Major]

On the pirate issue, we stood accross the street from a pirate station in Hollywood 2-3 weeks ago, in plain view with the Hollywood Police Department showing them the off-the-scale reading on our field strength meter and pointing at the 2-bay antenna on top of the building. We must have scared somebody who saw us from inside the building because the full-time pirate station ceased operation within 24 hours. The FCC and FDLE, along with the Hollywood PD were ready to take this one down.
CALL FM/Rob

I don't get up to Broward very often, but I can tell you for sure that the reggae pirate station on 91.7 FM was broadcasting on the morning of Saturday October 07th and on the evening of Wednesday October 25th. On the former date it totally obliterated CALL-FM on I-75 in southern Broward, and on the latter date it was a weaker form of what I had heard on the previous date but it was the same station again wrecking havoc with CALL-FM. The reggae station's weak signal wouldn't let up on the latter date until I had cleared I-75 by several miles (driving westbound / southbound on the northern end of the Homestead Extension of Florida's Turnpike). Once I got south of U.S. 27 (Okeechobee Road) CALL-FM had won the battle of the airwaves.

Can we upgrade it again to 100,000 watts ?

THE MAJOR

 

[livingfruitvirus]

Last time I was down there (Spring 06) there was a pirate in north Broward around I-95. I believe in the 88 Mhz frequency. The people on air sounded really drunk and like they were broadcasting in a gymnasium.