WOR off the air for the 4th

[MichaelD1972]

I wish I knew about the WOR outage last night. When WOR was temporarily off the air 5 years ago, I got Radio Rebelde from Cuba and WKOO Rose Hill, NC. The latter should've sign off at sunset.

Here's Radio Rebelde and Classic Country music mixing on 710 from 5/13/2021.

Here's Radio Rebelde by itself on the same day.

 

[PTBoardOp93]

Why would they be effected by heat?

All electronics are sensitive to temperature. If you took your phone or tablet and set it on the sidewalk in the sun for 10-20 minutes, it would probably refuse to operate "until it cools down."

Transmitters are the same way, just bigger. They are big enough that they generate meaningful heat on their own. You could probably heat a small apartment building (4-6 units) with the waste heat from the WOR transmitter. That's a problem, on a hot summer's day, when everything is already hot enough.

 

[Don CT]

All electronics are sensitive to temperature. If you took your phone or tablet and set it on the sidewalk in the sun for 10-20 minutes, it would probably refuse to operate "until it cools down."

Transmitters are the same way, just bigger. They are big enough that they generate meaningful heat on their own. You could probably heat a small apartment building (4-6 units) with the waste heat from the WOR transmitter. That's a problem, on a hot summer's day, when everything is already hot enough.

I get heat is bad, but why don’t more stations go down. They all had the same conditions.

 

[TheBigA]

I get heat is bad, but why don’t more stations go down. They all had the same conditions.

I've seen posts on the various boards here about several stations, including a station in Vineland NJ being off yesterday.

WHY WAS WVLT FM 92.1 off THE AIR ON SATURDAY 7/4/26

Why was the 92.1 FM transmitter off the air on Saturday 7/4/26. Why was Steve Diorio's show only heard on WVLT.COM and on Facebook but was not carried at all on 92.1 FM. Was work being done on the 92.1 transmitter or antenna system? Will Steve Diorio be back on 92.1 FM next Saturday 7/11/26 or...

radiodiscussions.com

It mainly affected AM stations. Most of NYC's FM stations are in the ESB. They pay a lot for being there, and some of it is for AC.

 

[PTBoardOp93]

I get heat is bad, but why don’t more stations go down. They all had the same conditions.

It wasn't that hot in New York over the weekend, relative to what you might get in Dallas, Tuscon or Rio de Janiero, so clearly we know how to design transmitters to endure heat for days on end.

Obviously WOR had some kind of equipment failure. We don't have any way to know what kind, and we will probably never find out. Being a major AM station in market #1, they have lots of redundant systems, including a generator and a backup transmitter.

 

[Weiserguy]

It wasn't that hot in New York over the weekend, relative to what you might get in Dallas, Tuscon or Rio de Janiero, so clearly we know how to design transmitters to endure heat for days on end.

Obviously WOR had some kind of equipment failure. We don't have any way to know what kind, and we will probably never find out. Being a major AM station in market #1, they have lots of redundant systems, including a generator and a backup transmitter.

But do they have backup air conditioning for the transmitter building?

If that dies and there's no redundancy, the station's toast.

 

[luperm]

But do they have backup air conditioning for the transmitter building?

If that dies and there's no redundancy, the station's toast.

I read elsewhere that it was a cooling issue and that WXBK has separate cooling facilities from WOR.
Stuff happens.

 

[PTBoardOp93]

But do they have backup air conditioning for the transmitter building?

I would assume so. It's a really obvious thing to have, especially for a 50 kW station. But never having inspected the site, I can't say.

 

[TheBigA]

I would assume so. It's a really obvious thing to have, especially for a 50 kW station. But never having inspected the site, I can't say.

Once again, this was a HOLIDAY. They couldn't just send someone across the river to check the site. Everybody was off.

 

[Weiserguy]

Once again, this was a HOLIDAY. They couldn't just send someone across the river to check the site. Everybody was off.

Uh, no no no no no. When your station dies, holiday or not, you find someone to go to the site and triage it. Even if you have to pay the guy golden time (as you yourself wrote about in another thread some time back), it's cheap compared to the revenue you're throwing down the toilet by being dead air for an entire holiday weekend.

 

[TheBigA]

it's cheap compared to the revenue you're throwing down the toilet by being dead air for an entire holiday weekend.

It wasn't the whole weekend. It was about 12 hours. The problem was identified at 8 PM, corrected by 9PM.

This is the lowest rated station in the cluster. Not a lot of money involved. Most of it from infomercials.

It may have been golden time. Or it may have been handled by a management type.

 

[Gregg.]

Uh, no no no no no. When your station dies, holiday or not, you find someone to go to the site and triage it. Even if you have to pay the guy golden time (as you yourself wrote about in another thread some time back), it's cheap compared to the revenue you're throwing down the toilet by being dead air for an entire holiday weekend.

Let's remember radio stations were once so concerned about being on the air for their listeners and advertisers that they'd sign off for a couple of hours each weekend, usually overnight Sunday, to test their equipment and make sure it is working properly. There'd be a chief engineer and several assistants, all trying to keep that operation on the air. These days, even a 50,000 watt clear channel station likely has nobody at the transmitter most of the time. That's partially because technology is better but partially to save staffing costs.

WOR uses three towers for its directional antenna system. While WBBR 1130 is a former Class I-B that is non-directional by day but directional at night, WOR is a former Class I-B that's directional at all times, maybe stemming from the days when it tried to cover both NYC and Philadelphia. And at night, it has to protect 710 KIRO Seattle.

 

[phildavis]

It wasn't that hot in New York over the weekend, relative to what you might get in Dallas, Tuscon or Rio de Janiero, so clearly we know how to design transmitters to endure heat for days on end.

I've bee to transmitting facilities in many places and when it comes to "summer cooking" time many have AC units that make them colder than the freezer in your house.

 

[kevtronics]

WOR used to have a 10 kW backup transmitter. Also can't modern transmitters automatically reduce their power if there is inadequate cooling?

 

[Weiserguy]

WOR used to have a 10 kW backup transmitter. Also can't modern transmitters automatically reduce their power if there is inadequate cooling?

There's a difference between "inadequate" cooling and "no" cooling. The xmtr might need to reduce power to zero. (Which is, in effect, what seems to have happened at WOR.)

 

[davideduardo]

It wasn't that hot in New York over the weekend, relative to what you might get in Dallas, Tuscon or Rio de Janiero, so clearly we know how to design transmitters to endure heat for days on end.

Why do you mention Rio de Janeiro? In the hottest months of January and February, the average daytime temperatures are around 87, which is not a challenge for fairly standard air conditioning.

For severe AC issues, look at Palm Springs, where summer temperatures can be as high as 124° to 125°. Similarly, Las Vegas comes close to that and puts great demands on A/C at transmitter sites. What most businesses... not just transmitter sites... learn is to have at least two separate A/C systems, either capable of keeping the facility within sustainable temperatures.

Heck, in a Palm Springs suburb we have 5 separate AC systems, one for each area of the home.

 

[Todd Mitchell]

What else is left on the channel at this point? Bismarck, Shreveport, Amarillo, Duluth/Superior are all 10 kW or less - and eventually you get to Seattle, the other 50 kW.

North America's largest daytime land coverage is only 5kW. So is the next one. (KFYR Bismarck; WNAX Yankton.)

 

[kevtronics]

What else is left on the channel at this point? Bismarck, Shreveport, Amarillo, Duluth/Superior are all 10 kW or less - and eventually you get to Seattle, the other 50 kW.

If this was a year or two ago, you would've heard Radio Rebelde from Cuba on 710 kHz at night.