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Unusual happening tonight on 770

gar hi

gar hi

I decided to do a quick check of how the AMs were coming in tonight. The New York stations were very weak and being dominated by the Spanish stations except for what (I thought) was an extremely powerful signal from WABC. It was FAR more powerful than I've ever heard it down here in Tampa and it sounded more like a 50kw signal you'd hear from a station 500 or less miles away. So when I tuned in, it was some talk show about to go to break and then a series of commercials which sounded more like those you'd hear on some small town radio station, not WABC. And then they gave the station ID. It was WVNN from Athens, Alabama. According to the radio locator, it's a non directional 7kw in the day and directional 250 watts at night.

:eek:
 
WVNN in Northern Alabama has a habit of not powering down at night. A few years ago, they overrode WABC at night here in Kentucky EVERY night for weeks. If you look at their night coverage, you will see it goes south and virtually none of that puny 250 watt night power is supposed to go north toward KY.
 
Thanks for the reply. I looked at their nighttime directional 250 watt pattern and it's not even aimed in our direction. I figured they had to be running on a daytime mode but I'm surprised a station would do thatfor so long into the night without it being addressed.
 
You wonder how much something like this is monitored. That station may be located in the Central Time zone, but it appears they were still on way past their local sundown or whenever they should have powered down or otherwise taken the steps to what they were supposed to do. Sometimes, perhaps, a local station might continue like this if there was some kind of local emergency, but from what was heard over the air, it doesn't sound like that was taking place. It sounds more like someone was just failing to follow FCC rules especially when it was noted this has happened before. As the problem is evident for a good distance (heard in Kentucky, for example) and has happened before, you'd think something would be done about it.
 
I may have heard it in SWest Ohio. I was trying to fix some issues with my main receiver and doing some in-home DXing on my TRF at the same time and couldn't get an I.D. I assumed that it was WCGW in Nicholas, KY, operating after their normal sign-off. I believe they were playing country or Christian music, but I wasn't paying a whole lot of attention.

There is a construction permit for WHOA in Saraland, AL, with a day signal of 38KW and with lobes pointed north and S/SE. I wonder if it was on and hadn't powered down or maybe testing?

Now I wish I had my attention more focused.
 
WVNN is news-talk. The best way to get an easy ID on it is to listen for Alabama basketball, since they have to be the only 770 in the world to carry the games.
 
for the first time EVER last Friday night, around 7:30 EST, WABC faded out at my
home in Pittsburgh, PA and was overtaken for a brief time by the venerable WVNN
out of Huntsville, AL. Truly a stunning occurrence when you look at the relative
wattage of the two stations. I had listened to WVNN while in Huntsville but had
never picked them up here in the north before. Certainly not overriding WABC.
 
I'll be able to listen tonight when it's getting dark and see what comes in on 770. Is it possible they were given permission to boost their nighttime signal and it just hasn't been documented? As it is, WABC is the weakest of the big three NY 50 kw stations from where I am and it will only come in fairly good for brief periods at a time. WFAN is always there but it's usually overridden by the Spanish station. WCBS is by far the strongest and often comes in pretty good and for long stretches. It can always be heard at night, even if the Spanish station on that frequency comes in stronger. That WVNN has an impresive signal down here for a 7kw station that far away.
 
Back in the 1990's, I worked at WCGW-770 in Nicholasville, KY (Lexington area) which is a normally a 1 KW Non-Directional Daytimer. As a member of the NRC (National Radio Club for AM DXers), I asked and received permission from WCGW management to conduct some DX Tests during "experimental hours" during the middle of the night for AM DXers. One year, I set-up a cassette tape up to record the broadcast at my home in Lexington. My house is only about 6 or 7 air miles from the transmitter, so I figured I would get a decent signal of the test on the tape. When I got home, WVNN was clearly heard throughout the entire half hour I had WCGW on the air from 3-3:30 AM. WABC was barely audible on the tape. The WCGW-770 studio is just east of Versailles, KY (about 15 miles from the transmitter) and on the over-the-air monitor, WVNN was really tearing up the signal... Apparently, they have been running high power at night (non-directional) for some time from what I have observed.
 
I was in the Isle of Palms, SC a few weeks ago and WCBS 880 and WBBR 1130 seemed to be the strongest NY stations I could get
 
the Huntsville area has lousy ground conductivity, which makes this all the
more surprising.
 
If I'm not mistaken, WVNN's stick is in Florence, AL. Not sure off the top of my head what the COL is, but the area they're trying to cover is Huntsville. That may explain things if they're "forgetting" to power down.

In a prior life in the 1990s, I used to get into Huntsville several times a year. Normally, what you got at night on 770 in Huntsville was a mix of Spanish and WABC. WVNN was usually totally absent.
 
WVNN's COL is Athens, if I remember correctly. It's a two site operation if I remember correctly, with a single day tower on the highway to Huntsville, and a three tower night site off I-65 north of Athens.

I've heard WVNN several times during sunset hours here in central Miss but never at night. I used to travel that stretch of I-65 between Athens and Birmingham at night a lot and the signal was surprisingly durable, lasting 30-40 miles some nights going south.

The station's on FM now, too, but I don't think the FM reaches the rocket city very well at all.
 
i'm about 15 miles from the WVNN towers by I-65, and not a single sound on 770 here right now at 11:30 pm
 
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