Soon after the BBC began work on the construction of their new East Asia Relay Station in the isolated jungle area of the New Territories of Hong Kong, they also began planning for another new relay station somewhere else in the Asian arena. The BBC East Asia Relay Station at Tsang Tsui in the far west of the New Territories with its two shortwave transmitters at 250 kW was taken into full service on September 27, 1987.
At that time, active planning for
this another shortwave station was underway, and serious consideration was
given to several different sites in the country areas of the Asian Kingdom of
Thailand. In the original planning,
the projected new shortwave station in Thailand was intended to be a joint
project between the BBC in London and Radio Netherlands in Hilversum Holland
for major coverage into the Indian sub-continent. Interestingly, the ABC and Radio Australia in
Melbourne Australia also demonstrated an interest in a shortwave relay station
in Thailand during that same era.
However, in October 1990, Radio
Netherlands announced that it was withdrawing from the shortwave project in
Thailand, due to what it considered to be exorbitant costs for installation and
operation. Initially, the BBC estimated
that the station would cost $17 million to build, with an additional $3½ million as an annual budget for
operation, though subsequent reality demonstrated that the final cost for
construction together with grants to the Thai government was more than double
the original estimate. It would be
presumed that Radio Australia faced the same financial problem, as they made no
progress in this direction.
Three
years later (1993), the BBC enlarged their planning for the Thailand project
when it became evident that their new station in Hong Kong would indeed need to
be closed and demolished before the British territory of Hong Kong was
officially handed over to China. Thus
the planned target coverage for the new
Thai station was considerably increased, from coverage into the countries surrounding
the Indian sub-continent, to now include all of the countries of Asia and the
Far East. Interestingly at that stage
(1993), Radio Australia again evinced an interest in a shortwave relay station
in Thailand.
In the second quarter of the year 1994,
the Thai government offered the BBC the choice of any of five different country
locations, all of which were thoroughly investigated prior to the final
decision. Ultimately, the final choice rested upon a compact site in the shape
of a large capital letter T in central Thailand 150 miles north of
Bangkok. The transmitter site is located
in a wetland area next to a small lake, some eight miles north of the small
provincial town Nakhon Sawan.
Work at this new BBC shortwave
station, with its four transmitters at 250 kW and thirteen antenna systems,
began in August 1994. On May 8 of the
following year (1995), a special ground breaking ceremony was conducted on the
site, with participation by representatives from BBC management and from the
Thai government. A crowd of people from
the surrounding villages also attended this grand local event.
Test transmissions began during the
following year (1996), followed by the gradual transfer of programming from the
BBC East Asia Relay Station in Hong Kong to the new BBC Asia Relay Station in
Thailand. At that stage, two new
Thomcast transmitters from France, Model TSW2250, had already been installed,
together with many of the antenna systems.
On November 18 (1996), the new
station in Thailand assumed the full load of programming from the station in
Hong Kong, though Hong Kong remained in standby mode for nearly three weeks,
until December 6. Then it was that the
two transmitters at 250 kW in Hong Kong, Marconi Model B131, were removed and
prepared for shipment to Thailand, where they were installed and activated very
early in the new year 1997.
Later in that same year (1997), on
October 29 to be exact, this new BBC Asia Relay Station in Thailand was
officially opened by His Royal Highness Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh,
during a royal tour of several Asian countries with Her Majesty Queen
Elizabeth.
During the year 2001, an additional
250 kW shortwave transmitter was installed together with an additional antenna
system. This new electronic equipment
passed acceptance tests in October, after which it was all taken into regular
service. In April 2009, the BBC Asia
Relay Station was off the air for a few days due to a local flooding emergency.
Then it was, at the end of the
broadcast day on December 31, 2016, that this important and very successful BBC
relay station was switched off, quietly and without any fanfare or advance
notice, for what has now become the last time.
Due to the failure of negotiations between the BBC and the Thai
government, the broadcast license was not renewed, and the BBC subsequently
announced the permanent closure of the station anyway, due to the very high
financial costs.
At the time of closure, this BBC
Asia Relay Station at Nakhon Sawan in central Thailand was operated under contract
with Babcock Media Services, and it contained five shortwave transmitters at
250 kW, thirteen curtain antennas.and four shorter antenna masts. We ask the question: What will ultimately
happen to this station, and what will happen to all of this expensive
electronic equipment? Will it be removed
and re-installed elsewhere? Who knows!
What we do know, is that those
international radio monitors who successfully received one of the readily
available QSL cards from this BBC Asia Relay Station in Nakhon Thailand, are
holding a nice piece of radio history that is no longer available.
(AWR-Wavescan/NWS 430)
