This Radio Tower Is Really DANGEROUS

I was Chief Engineer of a directional AM for decades (among other stations) and when they started putting up cellular towers, I used to get calls asking us to power down so the cell site workers could work on the pole without receiving love nibbles from it. Keep in mind, those are grounded poles and towers that were absorbing enough of the RF to have high voltage points along their length. I helped detune several for them so the workers could work on them safely while I stayed on the air. But all it took was for them to add some more feedlines or otherwise change the electrical length of the tower and the detuning was disabled.

Shocked by transmitted power from a mile away. Nicola Tesla smiles upon us.

It is easy to forget that radio wave are actual power being transmitted through the air. At first it didn't dawn on me why the two towers a mile away were what was causing the danger. Definitely something to remember when exploring old antenna sites!

I once went to a pharmacy near to Moorside Edge, to sort out their IT system. While I was there, I used their FAX/phone and noticed Talksport was breaking through on the handset. The staff said it was something they had learned to live with. I has a spare ADSL filter in the car, and that cured it completely.

I used to live less than half a mile from this transmitter while growing up. One year I was given an electronics set to play with which included an AM radio that I could build. The signal was so strong that it didn’t need the antenna wire attached!

Towers are great at turning RF into happy tingles ⚡️

In Bob Noakes book Last of the pirates, he mentioned getting shocks of Carolines aerial when they were off air. The signal from Veronica and RNI a mile away produced enough electricity in Carolines mast to light a florescent tube! This was used to light the ship for safety reasons when all of carolines generators had failed.

Bauer is the worst thing ever to happen to broadcast radio in the UK.

Again, your drone work is excellent. The shot of the plane flying by the antenna is most impressive! Thanks.

Congratulations on the milestone. I have got bit by an antenna before. It wasn't connected to anything at the time. It was a heck of a sting though.

I'm an HVAC guy, this is all wizardry to me, but I like it, it's like when I first learned of Coloumbs 😂😂😂

This video in the beginning reminds my of what they called as a "fantom" antenna. A radioamatour on the westcoust in Norway could not reach repeater on the other side of a mountain. He had 3 yageybeems. He set up one at home, and 2 beams back to back on top of the moutain, and then he was able to reach the repeater!!! Nice work I think! The best from LB1NH Arild 🙂

I had no interest in radio stations etc and for some reason YouTube reccomended your channel... Now I'm hooked! These are great videos ❤

I feel pretty lucky to recognize exactly what this video was going to be about as soon as I saw the directional AM sticks.

Pennine Radio is a blast from my past - the first local independent radio we could listen to in Bradford in the 1970s and we knew where the studios were!

At first I wondered why it could be dangerous even when switched off, then when you mentioned the other two masts nearby I knew what the problem would be. We did a special event radio demonstration maybe 15 years ago at the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester and located in the old railway station with a long wire outside. Graham had brought an countrpoise earth and tuner and connected it up while I was transmitting on my h/b 5 Watt output radio. He jumped back as he had received a shock. That's only 5 Watts. G4GHB.

Also be aware of lokal thunderflashes. they also could cause verry high voltages on the isolated tower. Same goes with airplanes. When refueling them you have to connect a ground lead first, to prevent flashes caused by static electricity

Great story and production, Lewis! RF fields decay following the inverse square law, but the TX powers here are so high, there is danger of RF burns at relatively large distances.

The original local commercial radio stations were precisely that - local stations with local content - not always local voices, but we forgive them for that - as long as they pronounced the local places properly - though I think they were given training or something - anything broadcast on that station was being broadcast from that station - some stations made programmes that were ultimately broadcast by other stations that were suitable for national broadcast, but there was no actual network programming - the only thing you were likely to hear on most stations simultaneously was the news from IRN - some stations included the IRN news within the bulletin, then had local news, whereas others mixed the two together - a pin item from IRN with the associated report, followed by a local story, alternating between the two - but, for the most part, everything was broadcast from the station itself - not some remote location in somewhere like London- although the stations had only IRN from 7 pm whether or not they took the regular daytime feed live - often broadcast specialist music shows in the early evenings, built around classical or rock or soul or folk - but they usually came from the station - by the mid-80s, some stations “merged” (really a takeover bid by the bigger of the two) - Metro and Tees being an example- between about 1986 and 1988, Radio Tees simulcast Metro Radio, originally from 1 am, then from 10 pm, then from 7 pm - Radio Tees still claimed to be broadcasting 24 hours a day - but with Metro Radio taking over between 7 pm and 7 am, it was not the case - even more bizarre was that Radio Tees relayed Metro via a landline, resulting in the broadcast being relayed in mono - how that = 24 hours a day in stereo, when it’s 12 hours a day in stereo from Stockton and 12 hours a day in mono from Swalwell? The downfall for local radio stations was the Network Chart Show - although it could be heard in stereo on Capital Radio and stations nearby who could use a radio to relay it in stereo, it was put out using the same landline they used for IRN - fine for the news, but hopeless for music- it was like listening on a portable kitchen radio! They did eventually use a satellite link, which improved reception! A radio station was offered to local commercial stations as an all night sustaining service - it was in stereo - called Radio Radio, but identifying itself as The Superstation, not all stations carried it - some only took it from midnight or 2 am, but others took it all - when that closed down, that saw some big companies turning into conglomerates and taking over each other - it was not uncommon to have programmes on several different stations simultaneously - then the AM services became various quasi-national stations with only local news, traffic news and local ads - national stations with limited local content - now they’re all Greatest Hits Radio or Heart!

100 K subscribers? Way to go! You deserve all the attention after all the work and research that you do.