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"Comet" Radio Scotland's floating flagship-and transmitter (offshoreradioco.uk)
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The
story of the Good Ship “Radio
Scotland” begins back in
the year 1904. That was the year in
which the John Brown Shipyards on the Clyde in Scotland built the 90 ft long,
500 ton, motorless barge LV “Comet”. The “Comet” was constructed
under contract to the Commissioner of Irish Lights in Eire for service as a
lightship in Dublin Bay.
At the end of some 60 years of
service at anchorage as a lightship near the city of Dublin, the “Comet” was
decommissioned and towed to St. Peter Port on the island of Guernsey in the
Channel Islands. Here it was, now under
the ownership of entrepreneur Tommy Shields, that the ship was fitted out as a
mobile radio station, with studio, transmitters and additional electronic
equipment.
The studio was prefabricated at the
RCA facility at Sunbury on Thames and two RCA Ampliphase transmitters, Model
BTA10 at 10 kW, were shipped from the United States. All of the radio equipment was assembled in a
warehouse on Guernsey and readied for installation into the ship. A mobile crane was used to lower the
preassembled equipment into the “Comet”
The studio was installed in what had
previously been the Captain’s Cabin when the ship was operating in Irish
waters; a 30 kW Deutz power generator was installed; and an aluminium mast 200
feet tall was attached to the stub of the previous wooden mast. One of the main problems associated with the
mobile crane and its task of transferring the heavy equipment from the dock
into the ship was that the tidal movement at this location at the island of
Guernsey varies as much as 30 feet each day.
The “Comet” , still as a motorless barge, was
towed from Guernsey up into Scottish waters via
the east coast of England. On the
way, the tow rope broke and it took two days to reattach the rope.
The new stationary location for the “Comet” was 3½ miles off the
Scottish coast near Dunbar, approximately 25 miles from Edinburgh. The target date for the initial broadcast
from the “Comet” under the
identification slogan “Radio
Scotland” was scheduled
for the last day in December 1965. This
advertised time was barely achieved, only just 10 minutes before midnight,
though this inaugural broadcast was on the air at reduced power.
The
inaugural broadcast was heard at a good level in nearby Edinburgh and across
the open waters in Scandinavia, though the signal into Glasgow and the west of
Scotland was quite poor. The signal into
all of the mainland areas was improved significantly a couple of weeks later,
on January 16, when a special part from the United States was installed, thus
enabling full power operation.
The initial mediumwave channel was
1241 kHz, though this was modified to 1259 kHz after the specialized American
part was installed in 1966. Though there
were two mediumwave transmitters at 10 kW each aboard the “Comet”, and a locally
made combining unit had been installed, yet usually only one transmitter was on
the air at any one time.
On February 10, still in the same
year 1966, the radio ship “Comet” was flooded during a storm. A Coast Guard ship came to the rescue with a
bilge pump that removed this undesired intrusion.
As with so many of the pirate radio
ships around the British Isles and associated areas back then, Radio Scotland
aboard the LV “Comet” underwent its
share of troubles. Due to a poor signal
in the more heavily populated areas of Glasgow, arrangements were made for the
motorless ship to be towed to the western side of Scotland.
Again, this motorless ship was towed
for the 1,000 mile voyage around the northern coast of Scotland, from its
stationary location off the east coast of Scotland (Edinburgh side) to a new
location off the west coast of Scotland (Glasgow side). This voyage took a few weeks and initially
they were on the air as they travelled.
However, due to the difficulty in replenishing the slowly traveling
mini-convoy, radio transmissions were discontinued halfway through the journey.
When they arrived at their new anchorage
off the coast at Troon, Radio Scotland returned to the air, and a survey showed
that almost half of the total population of Scotland listened to the pirate
programming from the good ship “Comet”.
However, due to a misunderstanding as to the boundary between the legal
coastal waters of Scotland and the open seas, Radio Scotland was taken to court
and fined for illegal broadcasting from Scottish waters.
So again, the “Comet” was towed to a
new location, this time off the coast of Northern Ireland near Ballywater. On April 9, 1967, the station returned to the
air as Radio Scotland & Ireland, though briefly at one stage the
identification announcement stated Radio 242.
That didn’t work
financially, so again the ship was towed to another location this time the more
then 1,00 mile voyage back to its original location at Dunbar, off the east
coast of Scotland for improved coverage of Edinburgh and its surroundings. That
was in May of the same year,1967.
However, the end was on the horizon,
and advertising revenues did not cover expenses. Thus, the final epic broadcast of the very
popular Radio Scotland ended in the evening of Monday August 14, 1967. The ship was then towed to Dunbar on the
coast and offered for sale. When a sale
did not materialize, the ship was towed to Methill Harbour in the Fife and all
of the electronic equipment was removed.
The “Comet”’ was then towed to Holland where it
was in use for a while as a house boat.
Then two year later, (1969) it was taken to Ouwerkerk and broken up.
In addition to its shipboard
facility, Radio Scotland also maintained an office in Scotland, on Cranworth
Street, just off Byres Road in West Glasgow.
At one stage, an advertising office was in use in Royalty House on Dean
Street in London.
At the end, listeners by the
thousand signed a petition to save Radio Scotland, with a request to grant a
legal license for a land based station.
The petition with 2½ million signatures was presented to
the government licensing agency in London, but the request was denied.
A few short years later,
entrepreneur Tommy Shields was hospitalized with a kidney problem, from which
he never recovered. He died at the young
age of 49, with his lifelong dream unrealized.
(AWR Wavescan/NWS 302)
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