Tag Archives: Jeff White

September 13, 2017: Update from WRMI–9,395 kHz on air at low power

Many thanks to Jeff White, at Radio Miami International, who writes with the following update:

Florida Power & Light Company has announced that most customers in our part of Florida should have electricity restored by the end of this coming weekend — that is by Sunday, September 17. So we hope to be back on the air here at WRMI by that date or before.

Meantime, we have one frequency on the air at very low power using our generator: 9395 kHz. This will be on 24 hours a day with regular programming.

We are making repairs in the antenna field so that by the time electricity returns, we will be ready to resume our full schedule of operations.

Jeff White

Thanks for the update, Jeff! We’re all so happy the WRMI crew made it through Hurricane Irma safely and happy to hear you may have power as early as this weekend.

We’ll publish all of Jeff’s updates here on the SWLing Post.

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WRMI: Hurricane Irma has done “extensive damage”

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(Source: WRMI on Facebook)

1430 UTC Monday, September 11

Hurricane Irma has done extensive damage at WRMI in Okeechobee, Florida.

Two antenna towers are down and many poles holding transmission lines are also down.

Power went out at around 2030 UTC Sunday, and it may not be restored for days.

Meanwhile, all transmitters are off the air. Our Internet service is also down, which means that our live stream is down as well. All of our staff are OK. We’ll try to provide more information later today here on Facebook. Thanks for all of your messages of support.

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WRMI prepares for Hurricane Irma

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Hurricane Irma is currently a Category 5 storm with maximum sustained winds at 185 mph. (Image: NOAA.gov)

(Source: WRMI on Facebook)

Hurricane Irma:

Thank you to all of our listeners who have inquired about our hurricane plans. At the moment (early Wednesday local time), it appears that the eye of Hurricane Irma will come right over or very close to Okeechobee by Sunday or Monday.

We will stay on the air as long as possible and as long as it’s safe. Our transmitter building is quite prepared to withstand most hurricanes, and our antennas have survived many hurricanes in the past with little damage.

However, electrical power generally goes out during or after most strong hurricanes, and our generator will only power our lights, computers and air conditioning. Unfortunately we don’t have enough generator power to operate 14 x 100-kilowatt transmitters. So if the power goes out, we are off the air.

We may have enough power to maintain one frequency on the air even during a power outage, and it looks like this will probably be 9455 kHz.

At the moment, our Internet is down, but we hope it will be back up soon, although it could go out again later. We’ll keep you informed as best we can. Thanks again for your interest.

The current hurricane model does show Irma heading straight toward Okeechobee:

Here’s wishing WRMI the very best weathering this monster of a storm. Let’s also hope any SWLing Post readers in the path of Irma make it through without any problems.

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WRMI: Back on the air

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Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Richard Langley, who notes that the following update posted on the WRMI Facebook page:

“WRMI went back on the air around 1600 UTC Friday when our power came back on. All transmitters except #4 are now back on the air, and we hope to have #4 back on later today.”

I’m happy to hear WRMI made it through Hurricane Matthew relatively unscathed!

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Hurricane Matthew: WRMI battons down the hatches

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(Source: WRMI at 23:00 UTC, 06 October 2016)

Our windows are boarded up, but we are still on the air here at WRMI as Hurricane Matthew approaches the east coast of Florida at 2300 UTC Thursday, October 6. The worst winds and rain are expected during the next several hours.

Nuestras ventanas estan protegidas por planchas de madera, pero todavia estamos en el aire aqui en WRMI mientras el Huracan Matthew se acerca a la costa este de la Florida a las 2300 UTC el jueves 6 deoctubre. Los vientos y las lluvias mas fuertes se esperan durante las proximas horas.

I’m very happy to hear that WRMI has prepared for this storm and I certainly hope they’re able to stay on the air and have and suffer no storm damage.

Yesterday, WRMI posted the following notice:

To WRMI listeners: As of 1600 UTC Wednesday, October 5, Hurricane Matthew appears to have a path which will take the center of the Category 4 storm very near Okeechobee. We will have extremely strong winds and rain during the next few days, and there is the possibility of the loss of electrical power and/or Internet service. We will keep all of WRMI’s transmissions on the air as long as we have electrical power and it is safe to operate. But if you find that we are off the air sometime within the next 48-72 hours, it will be due to the hurricane, and we will attempt to resume regular operations as soon as possible after the hurricane passes and power is restored to our transmitter site. Thank you for your understanding.

I expect WRMI/Okeechobee will have to cope with hurricane force winds tonight. The west wall of the hurricane eye is currently travelling up the eastern Florida coast and is sure to tax the WRMI antenna farm.

Here’s hoping our friends at WRMI make it through unscathed.

Is Hurricane Matthew affecting any SWLing Post readers? Please comment!

UPDATE: (Source: WRMI at 7:45 UTC, 07 October 2016)

As of 0630 UTC Friday, our electricity is out at the WRMI transmitter site in Okeechobee. We are operating on emergency generator power, which powers our lights, air conditioning and computers. However, all transmitters are off the air except 6855 kHz, which remains on the air on extremely low power. Winds are extremely strong here, and we do not have an estimate of when electricity will be restored. The center of Hurricane Matthew is northeast of us now.

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Radio World: The evolution of shortwave radio

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Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Richard Langley, who shares the following article by James Careless in Radio World Magazine.

The article includes interviews with Andy Sennitt, Kim Andrew Elliott, Nigel Fry, and even yours truly. The following is a short excerpt taken from the introduction of the article:

(Source: Radio World)

OTTAWA, Ontario — With the advent of radio in the 20th century, the shortwave band (1710–30,000 kHz) soon became a hotbed of long-distance radio broadcasting. Used primarily by state-run international broadcasters, plus ham radio operators and ship-to-shore radio communications, the shortwave band was prized due to its astoundingly broad reach.

That reach was — and is still — made possible by the tendency of ground-based shortwave radio transmissions to bounce off the ionosphere and back to earth; allowing shortwave broadcasts to “hop” repeatedly, increasing a broadcast’s range while minimizing its decay.

[…]At the height of the Cold War, the shortwave bands were packed with content as the Voice of America and West Germany’s Deutsche Welle (Voice of Germany) traded ideological punches with Radio Moscow and East Germany’s Radio Berlin International. This is because analog shortwave radio broadcasting was the only way for both sides to make their political cases cross international borders: There was no satellite TV, let alone any internet.

Read the full, in-depth article on the Radio World website…

This article is well worth reading and one of the more in-depth pieces I’ve seen in a trade publication or news site recently.

I should add that I completely agree with James Careless’ conclusion:

“[T]he research that went into this article suggests that the shortwave band is sufficiently alive to be still evolving.”

The fact is, the shortwave landscape is not what used to be in the Cold War. Many of those big voices have left the scene and, in the process, left the door open to others.

The shortwaves are a dynamic communications space that continues to evolve.

That’s why I keep listening.

Want to read more about the future of shortwave radio? Click here to read Does Shortwave Radio Have a Future?

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WRMI to cover 2015 sporting events

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(Source: WRMI press release)

OKEECHOBEE, FLORIDA, USA – America’s most powerful radio signal will carry previews and highlights of some of the world’s top sporting events throughout 2015. WRMI (Radio Miami International) will provide exclusive shortwave coverage from the USA for more than two dozen leading events in sports, including hockey’s Stanley Cup finals, baseball’s World Series, football’s Super Bowl and international tournaments involving soccer, cricket and rugby.

WRMI sports director Bruce Baskin provided daily reports on last weekend’s Army-Navy football game (won by Navy, 17-7) and is presently providing updates on soccer’s Club World Cup, which features seven of the globe’s top sides converging in Morocco. “This will be different from our WRMI Scoreboard,” says Baskin. “Rather than giving scores and short stories from several sports per day, we’re going to focus on specific events for days at a time. In essence, we’re going from a ‘miles-wide, inches-deep’ approach to the opposite.”

After purchasing and moving to the former Family Radio broadcasting site in central Florida one year ago, WRMI now possesses twelve 100,000-watt transmitters (with a 50,000-watt backup) along with 23 antenna systems on a 660-acre complex, making it America’s farthest-reaching radio station. WRMI first signed on in 1994 and has been managed throughout its duration by Jeff White, a past president of the National Association of Shortwave Broadcasters.

175 Fontainebleau Blvd, Suite 1N4, Miami, Florida 33172 USA
Tel +1-305-559-WRMI Fax +1-863-467-0185 E-mail [email protected] Website www.wrmi.net

WRMI 2015 Sports Coverage Calendar

JANUARY (2)
12 NCAA Football Playoff Championship
18 NFL AFC/NFC Championships

FEBRUARY (2)
2 NFL Super Bowl
22 NASCAR Daytona 500

MARCH (2)
12 F1 Miami E-Prix
23-29 ICC Cricket World Cup

APRIL (2)
4-6 NCAA Final Four
9-12 PGA The Masters

MAY (3)
2 TRA Kentucky Derby
16 TRA Preakness Stakes
24 IRL Indianapolis 500

JUNE (3)
6 TRA Belmont Stakes
8-18 NHL Stanley Cup Finals
18-21 PGA U.S. Open

JULY (2)
10-13 ITF Wimbledon Finals
16-19 PGA British Open

AUGUST (2)
13-16 PGA PGA Championship
22-24 LLB Little League World Series

SEPTEMBER (2)
13-14 ITF U.S. Open Finals
18-31 IRB Rugby World Cup

OCTOBER (2)
3 NCAA Air Force-Navy football
21-31 MLB World Series