I think I have that ability with any McClatchy paper, but then I keep seeing where individual papers are down to three of these a week and that's true with The Charlotte Observer. But I also seem to have unlimited access to any online content. I'm just trying to cut down on my online time.
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How are the Asheville stations covering the storm
- Thread starter secondchoice
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On the other hand, while I decided there were too many stories on the web site, they're doing the next best thing. Right now a subscription costs a dime.
Are you going to subscribe?
No, I have access to newspapers.com free with a month delay because I edit Wikipedia, and to text of many of the articles through my library.
Not as serious as folks' homes destroyed
or people missing or dead, but we had an Ingles grocrey store here in Jasper GA who is running all cash. Their offices, data processing, and main warehouse is just east of Asheville near Black Mountain. No credit or debit can be ran due to damage at the home office. Ingles at one time was the largest publicity held company in Asheville. They are the major food provider in the Western North Carolina. I don't think even Walmart can get groceries into their stores that are not damaged.
Apparently the road conditions are so bad President Biden can't land there without shutting down the only open highway in the area.
The best (in a really bad way) description of the I have heard:
This is the Katrina of the mountains.
BTW: Ingles bought the 1010 AM directional antenna field several years ago to expand their operations.
or people missing or dead, but we had an Ingles grocrey store here in Jasper GA who is running all cash. Their offices, data processing, and main warehouse is just east of Asheville near Black Mountain. No credit or debit can be ran due to damage at the home office. Ingles at one time was the largest publicity held company in Asheville. They are the major food provider in the Western North Carolina. I don't think even Walmart can get groceries into their stores that are not damaged.
Apparently the road conditions are so bad President Biden can't land there without shutting down the only open highway in the area.
The best (in a really bad way) description of the I have heard:
This is the Katrina of the mountains.
BTW: Ingles bought the 1010 AM directional antenna field several years ago to expand their operations.
the Washington Post had an article Monday about WPTL in Canton delivering info from local emergency management officials to Haywood County residents after the US Forest Service and county emergency management staff worked to help get the station back on the air:
Excerpt:
Before the "save AM radio" crowd gets too excited, reading between the lines (and judging from photo included with the article), looks like it was WPTL's FM translator, not the primary AM signal, that the county emergency management folks worked to help put back on the air, but either way, still nice to hear about a local station serving their community in an emergency.
Excerpt:
US Forest Service crews cleared downed trees blocking the road to WPTL's tower, and county emergency officials ran a "250-foot extension cord" to the station's transmitter.
Before the "save AM radio" crowd gets too excited, reading between the lines (and judging from photo included with the article), looks like it was WPTL's FM translator, not the primary AM signal, that the county emergency management folks worked to help put back on the air, but either way, still nice to hear about a local station serving their community in an emergency.
OTA radio doing great job, I-Heart and Asheville Radio Group. each group tied all its stations together.
People thanking OTA radio . . . radio staff thanking its engineers. OTA TV doing good too but 7
, 16 and 21 off the air. 7 still on DirecTV . 13 may run out of fuel, can not get to site ,trees blocking roads. They say they got a plan if they go off,using Channel 40 they own.
Cell service still bad in many places since last Friday, ours came back 9/30 but out again 10/1 back today 10/2. All cells carriers having issues.
Internet still down in many places.
We got power back late Monday afternoon.
That's it for now.
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I need to buy something I can only buy at Ingles and I didn't have time yesterday, but I was aware of this and hope they can fix the problem soon.
Even if WLOS is still on the air, I can't imagine who's in a position to even see TV. It does make me wonder: Are we SURE we want to do away with over-the-air broadcasting?
Don't think last post made it OK.
People I know if they are streaming now but don't get regular TV with streaming service are using an indoor antenna to watch regular TV, it works fine for them. They still watch OTA TV.
I'm thinking the combination of terrain and the fact WLOS is VHF combine to make that a problem.
Without getting into a technical explanation, mountains, thermal inversions and foggy valleys (Smokey Mountains) all of which can affect OTA TV signals too. The Ashville area includes Mt. Mitchell the tallest mountain east of the Mississippi. If the ownership thought moving to an UHF channel would improve things they have had plenty of time to change. The signal is competitive in Greenville. Greenville's channel 7 is on VHF 11. So I guess VHF works OK for these two particular stations. I don't remember exact average but I am pretty sure OTA TV still does over 10 % of the viewership.
At my house OTA Atlanta TV signals are usable most of the time. Believe it or not Atlanta's channel 11 (actually VHF 10) is the most reliable up here. Then GPTV channel 8 (actually VHF 7) isn't as reliable as the Atlanta the Atlanta UHF stations. Of course I am at the very edge of the Atlanta TV stations OTA signals and I have an antenna in the attic.
You at least have to have electricity.
YouTuber LGR lives in the Asheville area, and one of the last videos he uploaded before his house got destroyed by the storm showed how he gets poor DTV reception using one of those cheap flat indoor antennas (13:35 in the video):
I have a "mud flap" antenna in my attic. Works better than the 3 others I tried. Unfortunately no antenna will overcome a bunch of mountains. OTA (radio or TV) is just tough in Western NC.
I can't get in my attic. There is a very small opening and doubt it would be possible to anything significant.
I'm concerned about putting anything outside because of what the weather might do.
I'm concerned about putting anything outside because of what the weather might do.
Even an old-fashioned pair of rabbit ears will work better than one of those mud flap antennas, if your local DTV stations have their RF channels on VHF -- especially VHF-Low (channels 2 to 6) -- instead of UHF.
You are correct, but Channel 13 up on Mt, Mitchell has a very good signal overall . . . and using an indoor antenna works, maybe not perfect but it works . . . you got to be patience with ATSC 1.0 but again- it works. Naturally older people are patience with it, but younger people (some) are seeing the light that their Cell Phone, the Internet, steaming, etc. most likely will not be there following a serious event.
But OTA and Radio will be there, I-Heart and Asheville Radio Group did a great job and still are doing it. They proved it.
OTA TV too. They both proved it over the last 5 days or so.
I heard people (call into radio during this event) as I may have said, admitting they don't listen to radio anymore but were so thankful that radio was there for them, immediately following the storm . . . many stations on generators and as I said the on air staff were praising the engineering staffs at the stations.
OTA Radio & TV works . . . I have said before your Smartphone will tell you "the craps going to hit the fan" but most likely after it does, it is the broadcasters Radio & TV that will help you get back on your feet. This incident proved that.
Someone on the TV boards will have a technical reason but from from what I can tell the higher the VHF channel the better for DTV.
In commercial FM, frequency is not a big deal, height above average terrain, on and next channel stations, and power are major factors.
Some advice: When I cut the cord and started using OTA , I went to Walmart and stared buying antennas, I exchanged (with no hassle as long as the box was OK) 4 antennas ( cheapest to more expensive) until I ended up current antenna. This was over 10 years ago.
It's because lower frequencies are more prone to atmospheric and propagation effects than higher frequencies. That's one of the reasons why they got rid of channel 1, because it suffered the worst. And while this caused some interference on analog TV, you usually were still able to watch it... unlike DTV where it produces data errors in the digital signal and causes it to repeatedly drop out, making it unwatchable.
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