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January 23rd tornadoes claims WKLF Clanton's towers

tomservo

tomservo

The Birmingham News has a photo of the WKLF radio tower in Clanton that was destroyed by this morning's tornado in Chilton County. WKLF's license has been deleted for what seems like years, but they've kept on broadcasting all this time and even got an FM translator a while back.

It appears there were few if any injuries from this tornado, which struck Maplesville as well as Clanton. People were not so lucky around Birmingham, however, where scores of injuries and a few deaths came from a long track tornado that hit Oak Grove, Fultondale, Pinson, Center Point, Clay, Chalkville and Trussville. I hope everyone here made it through these terrible storms without issue.
 
Scanning the dial this morning (7am-8am) I would say WAPI did the best job covering the storms/damage. 99.5 was normal programming. Cox did well with a "non-news" staff, but Clear Channel was normal programming on their music stations...BIG FAIL for Clear Channel on this one. No, this event wasn't as big as April 27th, but this was a local story and many stations dropped the ball, IMO.
 
I guess it's hard to voice track a tornado.

Passed that tower a few time traveling from Alex City to Tuscaloosa.
 
Oxnard said:
Cox did well with a "non-news" staff, but Clear Channel was normal programming on their music stations...BIG FAIL for Clear Channel on this one. No, this event wasn't as big as April 27th, but this was a local story and many stations dropped the ball, IMO.
Click to expand...

I was kind of surprised to hear WZZK break away from Rick & Bubba to do their own coverage, but it sounded solid with JT, Lisa Mason, cluster operations manager Justin Case and others in studio providing info as they could find it. Definitely a missed opportunity by Clear Channel, which had really good coverage after April 27 but perhaps was caught off-guard by the overnight nature of this outbreak.
 
Weight County,

I wondered about that too. Something's strange here.
 
I think they have been allowed to stay on the air while appealing that decision. They've actually filed for a renewal of their license.
 
It looks like they are fighting three separate items: two former non-renewals and the FCC-denied sale in 2007. There is a six-month STA apparently granted in early November 2007. Naturally, that particular paperwork is absent on the FCC site.

Hopefully, they do have an STA of some sort. Otherwise, they have in effect been allowed to operate as a pirate for nine years, under the terms of their own now-deleted license.
 
Just out of curiosity, in your opinions, will WKLF be allowed back on the air legally by the FCC? I mean IF they were following the law, I would believe they would.
 
If they're operating under a STA, I would think so.

The puzzling part is the "DWKLF" remaining for so long. It doesn't make any sense that a deleted station and license could receive an STA at all.

But I'm all for stations surviving, if its possible. The FCC undeleting a station is rare, however.
 
They did supposedly get their license reinstated a couple years back, and now have a translator, W238BS(?) 95.5 FM. The FM was still on the air yesterday when I was passing through.
-Travis
 
"Undeleting" hasn't been that unusual lately. There have been a number of renewal snafus which result in the "D" marking pretty quickly. But the stations are usually able to resolve the situation & get "undeleted" in a few weeks, often after agreeing to pay a fine.
 
TALLRED said:
They did supposedly get their license reinstated a couple years back, and now have a translator, W238BS(?) 95.5 FM. The FM was still on the air yesterday when I was passing through.
-Travis
Click to expand...

Was it still doing programming? I did finally see the studio in a video on al.com and the tower's down but the studio looks OK, and the power was already back on.
 
I drove by the station today and It is back on the air with a long wire antenna. I talked with there engineer, he said they are running around half power and the studios did not have any damage except a 40 foot mast holding a FM antenna and a TV antenna for there EAS. They had the translator back in operation via a Marti RPU around 3 hours after the storm. They ran on generator until the Power was restored around midnight Monday.
It seems they did not waist any time getting back in operation.
 
Zach said:
They sure were quick to get back on the air. Did you happen to ask what the status is of their license?
Click to expand...

Since they don't officially have a license, but they are still being allowed to operate while the deletion is contested, do they have to file for an STA to operate with a temporary antenna?

I don't see any application for a STA on file yet. May be a bit too soon.
 
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