New England RadioWatch: October 23, 1996

Flood Effects

by Scott Fybush

• A brief NERW this time around...as the region continues to recover from one of the heaviest rainstorms in recent memory. Some parts of Maine received over 19 inches of rain in just over a day, and many roads remain closed.

  One effect was clearly audible on the Boston dial: the absence of WNRB (1510) from the airwaves.

  WNRB's transmitter is in a very low-lying area of Waltham, along a stream called Beaver Brook. When the waters began rising Sunday night, they flooded the parking lot in which the station's four towers sit, then entered the concrete transmitter house, eventually rising more than a foot above the floor. Both the main 50kw Nautel transmitter and the backup suffered damage, and when NERW stopped by last night, an engineer was still removing water from the Nautel's cabinet.

  It's a credit both to WNRB's engineers and to Nautel that the station is back up and running this morning. NERW wishes them good luck...and the good long rest they'll undoubtedly need after all that bailing out.

  It will take a lot longer for Portland, Maine's WLOB (1310) and WLOB-LP (Channel 45) to make it back on the air. The station's building on Warren Avenue in Portland was flooded to the roof, and word has it that damage inside was extremely severe. WGAN (560) has its transmitter just across the highway from WLOB, but remained on the air throughout the storm.

• The AM dial west of Boston remains in a state of flux this week. First came the bankruptcy sale of Marlborough's WSRO (1470), and now there's been a change of format at Framingham's WKOX (1200). The Fairbanks Communications-owned outlet has dropped most of its syndicated talk lineup and is now carrying leased-time ethnic programming, presumably to help accomodate some of the programmers bumped from Boston's WROR (1150) when that station became Kidstar affiliate WNFT last week. And NERW is also hearing rumors that the nation's only commercial folk-music radio station, WADN "Walden 1120" in Concord MA, has switched to an all-volunteer staff to stay afloat. Earlier this year, WADN moved out of its rented space in Concord to a trailer at the transmitter site as a cost-cutting measure. Walden's a rare jewel; NERW hopes it can be saved somehow.

• TV viewers south of Boston may see the return of a long-dark signal later this month. WHRC (Channel 46), licensed to Norwell, has been dark since 1989. It will reportedly return from a new transmitter site near Brockton, programming infomercials.

• Much more on "radio with pictures" next time around, as we check out all the attempts around New England to beat the deadline for the last new TV licenses...as well as more of our look at Maine radio history.