Radio Broadcasting in the Land of the Mountain Lion - 4: Relay Services
From the very earliest days, the
various radio broadcasting services in Sierra Leone were very dependent upon the
relay of available programming from other sources as a supplement to that which
was produced locally in their own studios.
For a lengthy period of nearly three-forth's century, the BBC London was heard over
local distribution in Freetown.
Beginning
at the time when the cable radio service was implemented in 1934, most of the
programming that was provided by wire to the connected homes in Freetown was an
off air relay from the BBC in London, their Empire Service and their services
to Africa on shortwave. The cable system
was in operation for some thirty years and the BBC programming was piped into
the rediffusion system with the insertion of very little local productions, and
that quite frequently just for special events.
For
a total of sixty six years, the BBC programming was heard in Sierra Leone
consecutively via:-
Cable
radio
Experimental
shortwave from Freetown
SLBS
itself from the shortwave station at Hill Station
SLBS
shortwave from Goderich & Waterloo
SLBS
on mediumwave from Goderich
In
recent years, right up to the present time, the BBC is still heard on radio in
Sierra Leone, though now via dedicated FM relay stations in Freetown and the
regional city Kenema.
According
to the information in several editions of the World Radio TV Handbook, the next
relay service heard in Sierra Leone was provided, strangely enough, by Radio
Moscow. An off air relay of their news
bulletin in English was heard on shortwave and mediumwave at 1700 UTC daily for
a period of some fifteen years, beginning around 1968. This programming was carried by all of the
active transmitters in Sierra Leone at the time; mediumwave from Goderich and
shortwave from Goderich & Waterloo.
Shortly
after the commencement of the relays of English news from the Radio Moscow
World Service, a similar relay of news from the Voice of America was introduced
into the programming from the Sierra Leone Broadcasting Service. Initially, this was one bulletin of VOA news
each day, though beginning around 1975, the duration of the daily relays from
the VOA was increased.
The
WRTVHB shows the scheduling of VOA news at 1530 & 1600 UTC on all active
transmitters in Goderich & Waterloo, shortwave & mediumwave. However, it is quite possible that this relay
from the Voice of America was actually continuous for at least an hour back
during that era.
The
SLBS relay of VOA programming ended simultaneously with the end of relay
programming from the BBC & Radio Moscow, though these days VOA is heard on
FM in Freetown 102.4 MHz. There are no
known FM relays in Freetown from Radio Moscow.
The
experimental programming from Deutsche Welle in Germany was on the air
irregularly from the 250 kW shortwave transmitter at Waterloo in 1974 &
1975. Station announcements in this DW
programming were given in English, French & German, and the broadcasts
identified the transmitter location as Waterloo. These test broadcasts also included news and
music.
No
information is given as to how the Deutsche Welle programming from Germany was
received for rebroadcast in Sierra Leone.
It would be possible for this programming to be on pre-recorded discs or
tape, or on live relay from regular DW programming, or via telephone lines from
Germany, or even by local production at the SLBS studios in Freetown.
However,
two key items in the programming that was broadcast from Waterloo on behalf of
Deutsche Welle would seem to indicate that the programming was prepared in the
DW studios in Cologne in Germany and apparently fed to Freetown via a live
relay from a communication transmitter.
The inclusion of the Waterloo identification would indicate specific
programming, not a relay of regular programming; and the inclusion of news
bulletins would indicate a live relay.
It is known that on a few occasions over the years, Deutsche Welle
programming was carried via unannounced communication transmitters.
Only
one QSL is known for the DW test broadcasts from Waterloo and that was received
by Wendel Craighead of Prairie Village, Kansas in the United States for his
reception report dated January 28, 1975.
This broadcast was heard on 5980 kHz and the programming consisted of
news and music, with station announcements in English, French, and German, and
specific identification of the Waterloo location.
We
could also mention that the United Nations also produced radio programming for
broadcast into Sierra Leone, as did the Hirondelle Foundation in Switzerland
which was also in some ways associated with the United Nations.
On May 18, 2000, a total consignment
of radio equipment was imported into Sierra Leone, and just four days later,
the FM transmitter was inaugurated on 103 MHz.
This new station was identified as Radio UNAMSIL, Radio United Nations
Mission to Sierra Leone.
Soon
afterwards a 1 kW Harris shortwave transmitter was inaugurated on 6140 kHz,
though the signal was usually noted slightly off channel around 6138 kHz. The studios for this new station were
installed in the Mammy Yoko Hotel at Aberdeen Beach Freetown; and the station
was on the air twenty four hours daily.
Nine
years late, that is in 2009, the station left the air; some of the programming
was absorbed into the official SLBS government station and some of the
equipment was donated to a local public service radio station. A few international radio monitors were
fortunate enough to receive a form letter QSL in response to reception reports
on their shortwave channel.
However,
a couple of years before the termination of Radio UNAMSIL, the organization
Hirondelle of Switzerland, established a radio broadcasting service for Sierra
Leone. This organization established a
radio broadcasting studio in the Fourah Bay College of the University of Sierra
Leone in Freetown.
This
new broadcasting station was inaugurated in February 2007 under the slogan,
Cotton Tree News. In the center of
Freetown there is a large and very old Cotton Tree, several hundred years old,
and it is a national symbol for Sierra Leone, commemorating freedom for their
people.
Initially,
the broadcast of the programming from Cotton Tree News was heard in Freetown on
FM, and throughout Sierra Leone via a relay on international shortwave. The FM service was on the air twenty four
hours daily with two channels in use, 103 MHz & 107.3 MHz. The broadcast on shortwave was via the BBC
relay station on Ascension Island for just half an hour daily on the channel
9525 kHz, though another channel 13760 kHz was in interim usage for just a
short period of time.
Two
years after the inauguration of Cotton Tree on shortwave, a replacement relay
was taken into usage, Rampisham in England on 11875 kHz. The shortwave relays were discontinued in
2011, though the FM programming is still on the air on the single channel 107.3
MHz.
We
could also mention two other radio stations that were part of the broadcasting
scene in Sierra Leone. In 1991, a mobile
transmitter under the legal government callsign for Liberia, ELBC, was on the
air as the Voice of Peace, Harmony & Reconciliation. The well known Danish international radio
monitor Anker Petersen states that it was operated by the West African Peace
Keeping Force.
This
mobile transmitter was actually located not in Liberia, but just across the
border in Sierra Leone. No channel is
given though, as to whether it was operating on mediumwave or shortwave.
Then
in May 2009, the American radio magazine, Monitoring Times, listed a new Gospel
station at 10 kW for use on shortwave, though it apparently never got beyond
the licensing stage.
(AWR Wavescan/NWS 222 via Adrian Peterson)
