Paul Thurst – Page 119 – Engineering Radio

Tower take down video

Since the inception of youtube, I’ve watched hundreds of this tower collapse videos. I don’t know why, it interests me. This video is of the Coast Guard LORAN C tower in Port Clarence, Alaska. For what it’s worth, Port Clarence looks like a forlorn place, I am inclined to think my duty on Guam was rather nice in comparison.

This was filmed from six separate camera locations, including one at the base. It demonstrates how most towers fall within 1/3 of their constructed height. In this demolition, all three guy points are cut at the same time, removing the equalizing forces simultaneously. This would be the same situation as a catastrophic failure of a load-bearing tower member.

The best parts of this video are the camera view of the tower base, around 1:04-1:19, and the side view where the camera almost gets hit by a tower section, 2:02-2:13.

I love physics.

Corporate Controlled Media?

I don’t know, what do you think (starts about 1:10)?

It is utterly amazing that all those news copywriters came up with the same story lead in, across multiple networks and cities. This is one of those canned news items that stations pick up when they don’t have other news to fill a segment. Seems to be a slow news day.

Quality gear

I went to put the HD transmitter back on the air for WEBE yesterday, to be confronted with this:

Swearing ensued.

The fault is with the RF upconverter, which is unlocked. I don’t know why the GPS is unlocked, I’ll have to climb up on the roof and look at the antenna.

Why again, are we bothering with this?

National EAS Test Video

Video available by youtube, courtesy of Radio Magazine:

It is a pretty good simulation of what will happen on November 9th. The script used is not the actual script that will be used for the national test.

After the test, the video shows how to bail out of the national test in the event that a valid EAN is not received. This is important information, as this particular failure has occurred many times in the past. If the LP-1 or PEP station that transmitted the test fails to send a valid EOM, the EAS unit will continue to transmit that station’s programming indefinitely. If the LP-1 or PEP station resumes regular programming while the EAS unit is relaying their programming over the air, that would be a good indication that the LP-1 or PEP station has failed to send a valid EOM.

Update: Paper work is required.