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Salem Broadcasting Philadelphia can't buy a power generator for WNTP, WFIL?

Q

qtpieislit

I heard Rene Tetro sign off WNTP at 2:06am due to (announced on the air) Peco power problems precipitated by the weather. Pretty much rules out selected terrestrial radio broadcast companies being a reliable emergency action notification system in the event of a emergency that involves the electrical grid. So much for....'In the event of an emergency you would have been instructed where to tune in your area for news and official information. That concludes this test of the......'


As a critical note, this in no way should be construed as a slight or reflect on Rene who is unequivocally one of the ace CE's in broadcast engineering, with a remarkable long illustrious history at some of the premier, legendary high power multi tower AM facilities in many major markets over the decades, inlcuding WPTR, WZZD, WPAT, WNEW/WBBR, and now the 6 tower diplexed WNTP, WFIL, among others. Certainly as fascinating an individual as one could ever meet.
 
Most stations where I have worked had two transmitters (one for back-up) and an electrical generator in the case of power loss from the power company.
 
The regular programming on WNTP doesn't interest me, but I tried to tune in a Penn State football game one night and I couldn't tune in the station to get a clear, non-distorted sound. It always sounded like I didn't have it tuned in right. I listened to Wibbage for years and it was always clear in my part of eastern Montgomery county - what happened to their signal?
 
And there are still alot of stations out there who run 25 year old transmitters 24/7 and have no back up electrical. Everything runs great as long as the electric stays on!
 
Just for the record, the power problems at WNTP-WFIL Saturday night and Sunday morning were, at the very least interesting; and at the most, a major headache for both the stations and PECO.

The problems began at 7:58PM Satuday night when an underground PECO transformer that feeds the studios and transmitters at 117 Ridge Pike flooded from the heavy rain and snow melt off. (Can you say, "Big sparks and arcing?") The station switched immediately to our backup generator, which had about 1/2 tank of fuel. A full tank is 150 gallans which will keep the generator running for 24 hours. A half tank is good for 12 hours.

I was in Oneonta, NY on vacation, celebrating Christmas at my brother's. The stations' remote control systems sent me an alarm indicating the we were on generator. I imemediately called the PECO emergency number to report the outage. At 10PM I heard back from PECO explaining the nature of the problem. Understanding that this was not a routine power failure, I got in my car and quickly returned to Philadelphia, arriving about 1:30AM. After discussions with the on site PECO crews, I decided to shut the stations down at 2AM to conserve fuel by reducing the building load, anticipating to put the transmitters back on at 6AM.

PECO initially expected to have a replacement transformer installed by 4AM. Unfortunately, they ran into some major problems getting the old transformer out of the underground vault due to 50 years of mud, rust, corrosion, etc. Also, when they got the new transformer on site it was found that it was too large for the vault anyway. It was then decided to cover the vault and install an above ground, pad-mounted transformer. This put them way behind the anticipated repair time, moving it until 8-9AM.

At 6AM I signed the stations back on, but unfortunately in due course the generator died due to fuel starvation. I was able to get a small emergency delivery of fuel, which I ordered about 4:30AM. It arrived at about 8:40AM, just as PECO was completing the repairs. I was able to get the transmitters back on at 8:45, reboot the studio equipment and automation systems, and get WFIL and WNTP back on the air at 9:00AM.

This was one of those cases of "the best laid plans" going awry. The WNTP-WFIL generator is about 3 years old and performed excellently during the outage - until it ran out of fuel. It is capable of running WFIL at full power and WNTP on its auxiliary transmnitter at 5KW. I am already working with the generator and oil people to hopefully install a new 1200 gallon tank, which would alow us to operate up to 10 days on the generator without having to refill it.
 
Note to Sam Lit:
Regarding the whole EAS thing, I have to agree with you. There are a lot of balls that can be dropped under the present system; some of which are related to deficiencies at the broadcast station level. For the record, however, this is the first time that WNTP and WFIL have experienced a problem that had us off the air for so long. It was very frustrating since I was largely at the mercy of PECO.
Since we installed this new generator in 2006, previous outages have between 10 minutes and 1 hour. This was the first time we had to deal with a 13 hour outage. The other frustrating part of this for me is that local oil companies require a minimum of a 100 gallon order to get a delivery of off-road diesel fuel - which is why I had to wait until I got below a third of a tank to order an emergency delivery on Sunday morning. VERY FRUSTRATING! If I can get the external 1200 gallon tank installed, that will solve such problems.
 
Note to Mark Tillery:
Just so that we are talking apples and apples ---
WNTP has two transmitters: a Harris DX50 50kw main transmitter, and a Nautel AMPFET5 5kw auxiliary transmitter.
WFIL has two transmitters: a Harris DX10 10kw main transmitter, and a Nautel AMPFET10 10kw auxiliary transmitter.
Each station has four possible independent antenna system modes: Day DA, Night DA, NDA Mode 1, and NDA Mode 2, so it is fairly difficult to totally knock WFIL and WNTP off-the-air.
The generator is a Balder 80kw unit, with 150 gallon tank (good for 24 hours), which is good for most PECO problems. Unfortunately, this was not an ordinary short or medium term power failure.
 
Further note to Sam:
Hey did you get any good DX while we were off?
I was able to pull WIND, Chicago and WQAM, Miami quite clearly on my car radio during the night. I also was able to variously receive WNML Knoxville, CBW Winnepeg, CKGM, Montreal and WXCT, Soughington, CT on 990.
 
rtetro said:
Note to Sam Lit:
Regarding the whole EAS thing, I have to agree with you. There are a lot of balls that can be dropped under the present system; some of which are related to deficiencies at the broadcast station level. For the record, however, this is the first time that WNTP and WFIL have experienced a problem that had us off the air for so long. It was very frustrating since I was largely at the mercy of PECO.
Since we installed this new generator in 2006, previous outages have between 10 minutes and 1 hour. This was the first time we had to deal with a 13 hour outage. The other frustrating part of this for me is that local oil companies require a minimum of a 100 gallon order to get a delivery of off-road diesel fuel - which is why I had to wait until I got below a third of a tank to order an emergency delivery on Sunday morning. VERY FRUSTRATING! If I can get the external 1200 gallon tank installed, that will solve such problems.
Click to expand...

That's good. You can't really ask for a better plan than the one you described. I believe the new 1,500 gallon fuel tank will serve as a tremendous advantage to the stations should you encounter a similar situation again.
 
rtetro said:
Further note to Sam:
Hey did you get any good DX while we were off?
I was able to pull WIND, Chicago and WQAM, Miami quite clearly on my car radio during the night.  I also was able to variously receive WNML Knoxville, CBW Winnepeg, CKGM, Montreal and WXCT, Soughington, CT on 990.
Click to expand...

Wow Rene, Good stuff indeed. Unfortunately I live in a DX nightmare geographically. I'm in Penn Valley, actually right on the edge of Gladwyne. In fact when you walk outside of my place, the Roxboro antenna farm literally looms directly into the sky from across the river. I have grown up in this area all my life and without a doubt it has the worst AM skywave reception that I have experienced, much to my chagrin, anywhere in the Delaware Valley. So unfortunately I didn't get to experience the possibilities. But up on the Ridge, it is a somkin locale for reception.

I would have flipped to hear WIND and WQAM by skywave in Philly. WNML is a good catch too. Wow. You could have connected one of the towers to your receiving device. That would do the monster trick. Did you?
 
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