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| WRMI Transmitter displays |
As
most of our regular Wavescan listeners know, this program is recorded each week
at the studios of WRMI -- sometimes at our studio in Miami, but more often than
not at our studio in Okeechobee, where the WRMI transmitter site is located.
WRMI
-- Radio Miami International -- first went on the air from a transmitter site
in suburban Miami in 1994. At this location, there was one 50-kilowatt
transmitter and a corner reflector antenna beamed to the Caribbean and Latin
America. For part of its lifespan, WRMI-Miami also used a North American
antenna beamed toward Vancouver.
But
on the evening of November 30th, 2013, WRMI’s site in Miami went off the air
for the last time, and immediately the station’s new transmitter site in
Okeechobee went on the air for the first time.
Okeechobee
is a small city located on the north side of the massive Lake Okeechobee in the
center of Florida. The WRMI transmitter site is about 15 miles north and
7 miles west of the city of Okeechobee, located far out in the rural
countryside on a one-square-mile cattle ranch. The site was built by
Family Radio, a Christian organization based in Oakland, California, and was
owned and operated by Family Radio under the call letters WYFR until it closed
down in June of 2013. WRMI purchased the transmitter facility and put it
back on the air on December 1, 2013, which was actually the evening of November
30th local time in Okeechobee.
The
Okeechobee site is the largest privately-owned shortwave transmitter site in
the Western Hemisphere. It is comprised of 14 transmitters and 23
antennas -- a selection of rhombics and log periodics and one curtain array
antenna beamed to 11 different azimuths covering primarily North, Central and
South America, the Caribbean, Europe, the Middle East and Africa.
As
the site was off the air from the end of June until the beginning of December
2013, it was unknown exactly how quickly the equipment would return to normal
operating condition. When we first went
on the air on the evening of November 30th, a number of technical problems with
the transmitters quickly surfaced. Fortunately, we were not using all of
the transmitters initially, so when there was a problem with one unit we were
able to replace it with another transmitter until the repairs were made to the
first one. And gradually over the course of a few weeks all of the units
were brought back into regular operating condition, with the exception of two.
Transmitters
5 and 6 were very old Gates 50-kilowatt units that had been used by WYFR when
it was originally located in Scituate, Massachusetts, and later relocated to
the new site in Okeechobee in the late 1970’s. Both of these transmitters
were out of service at the time Family Radio went off the air, and transmitter
6 was actually scrapped and removed before Radio Miami International took over
the site. Transmitter 5 was not operational, and in fact many parts in it
had been cannibalized for use in the other WYFR transmitters.
Several
months after WRMI began its broadcasts from Okeechobee, the hole left by
transmitter 6 was replaced by a transmitter moved from WRMI’s old site in Miami
to the new one in central Florida. So now the station had 13 operating
transmitters. Only number 5 was inoperable.
All
13 working transmitters have been used most of the time over the past almost
two years. At this moment, 12 transmitters are on the air every single
day -- some for just a short period of time such as an hour or two a day, and
some for as much as 24 hours a day. The other transmitter -- number 1 --
was in daily use until just a couple of weeks ago, but is now in standby in
case something happens to one of the other transmitters and number 1 is needed
to fill in for a short time.
WRMI
has 14 Optimod audio processing units -- one for each transmitter. These
provide an extra punch to the signal. There is a large Uninterruptible
Power Supply which keeps computers, lights and air conditioning operating for
several seconds in the event of a power outage.
The
UPS is replaced by a 25-kilowatt diesel generator which kicks in approximately
20 seconds after a power outage. The generator is not powerful enough to
operate the transmitters themselves, but it keeps the computers and the rest of
the transmitter building operating until the power comes back on. Fortunately,
most of the power outages in Okeechobee are very short -- from a fraction of a
second to a few minutes in length.
Currently,
WRMI is transmitting about 150 hours per day of programming from a number of
clients including religious organizations and relays of overseas stations such
as Radio Japan, Radio Taiwan International, Radio Slovakia International and
Radio Prague. Dozens of smaller clients air a variety of programs on WRMI
including news and music shows, cultural programs and many others. WRMI
also broadcasts a variety of DX programs in English, Spanish, Portuguese and
Italian, including of course Wavescan.
As
for future plans, WRMI hopes to eventually replace the old transmitter 5 with a
new, or at least newer, unit, bringing the contingent back up to 14
transmitters. The station has a 23-year-lease with the owner of the
cattle ranch, so we hope to be on the air on shortwave for a long time come
yet.
By
the way, if you happen to be hearing one of the early transmissions of Wavescan
and you hear this announcement in time, you are cordially invited to WRMI’s
second anniversary Okeechobee Open House. It will be held at the
Okeechobee location. You can find the address on our website,
www.wrmi.net, and it will take place from 11 am until 5 pm local time on
Monday, November 30th. So if you’re in the Florida area, or can be in
Florida on November 30th, we invite you to come to our second anniversary
celebration.
(AWR Wavescan/NWS 353)