Stations Share Signals, Use the Web to Cover Katrina
Despite blown-off roofs and frothing seawater flooding stations, many broadcasters on the Gulf of Mexico stayed on the air despite Hurricane Katrina, though some couldn’t be reached by phone or e-mail.
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
Timely, relevant coverage of court proceedings and agency rulings involving tariffs, classification, valuation, origin and antidumping and countervailing duties. Each day, Trade Law Daily subscribers receive a daily headline email, in-depth PDF edition and access to all relevant documents via our trade law source document library and website.
The roof at WLOX (ABC) Biloxi-Gulfport-Pascagoula, Miss., was damaged by wind and parts of the building were under a foot of water, said Jackie Lett, pres. of the Miss. Assn. of Bcstrs. Storm updates were supplied from WLOX’s sister stations, Lett said.
WDSU (NBC) New Orleans fed coverage to viewers through WAPT (ABC) Jackson, Miss., Lett said. WDSU also streamed live video on its website by simulcasting through WAPT. WWL-TV (CBS) New Orleans streamed live images of its anchors covering the storm. Both stations presented their anchors in makeshift studios. At one point, WWL-TV seemed to be reporting in the dark. and then the sister station lost the signal. WDAM-TV (NBC) Laurel- Hattiesburg, Miss., was being simulcast on local radio stations including WSSY(AM), WMXI(FM) and WUSM(FM). Citadel Bcstg.’s WIBR Baton Rouge, simulcast its coverage on all company AM and FM outlets in the area. Clear Channel’s WJBO in Baton Rouge began simulcasting its coverage across all company stations in the area Sun., the firm said.
“The stations are much more prepared than when Camille hit,” Lett said. In 1969, Hurricane Camille killed 250 across the region. “Everyone was out. No one was able to communicate with anyone,” Lett said, adding that stations have been “battening down hatches” and taking proper precautions.
Viewers also could get storm coverage from stations outside Katrina’s predicted path. KATC (ABC) Lafayette, La., offered storm updates in crawls along the bottom of the screen, and squeezers, which insert a frame at the side of screen during regular programming, said KATA Gen. Mgr. Nanette Frye. “The storm is adjacent to us, so how do you warn your viewers? You don’t want to create a panic,” Frye said. The station did provide live coverage of Katrina 4-9 a.m. as the hurricane hit the Gulf. Then the station returned to regular programming.
In Mobile, Ala., WPMI-TV (NBC) was knocked off the air when lightning struck a generator powering its broadcast. The station’s website directed viewers to tune to Clear Channel’s WKSJ for coverage.
PBS hadn’t been able to contact the 8 public TV stations in La. since Mon. morning, COO Wayne Godwin told us. “The stations we are greatly concerned about are WLAE and WYES in New Orleans,” he said. The 9 public TV stations in Ala., bracing for the hurricane, were stocking up on diesel and “were in pretty good shape at the current time,” said PBS Senior Vp-Technology & Operations Edward Caleca. Miss. stations, which already had felt the hurricane’s effects, worry about towers not rated for high winds, Caleca added. Godwin said the towers were rated for 70 mph winds and stations were worried about gusts higher than that. “We would certainly hope that as far north as Oxford, they would not necessarily see 70 mph wind, but towers go well into the air and it’s a totally different atmosphere up there.”
Caleca said PBS will ask the Commerce Dept. for Public Telecom Facilities Program (PTFP) emergency funding if stations lose towers. PBS sent messages instructing stations in Katrina’s path to use alternative “Schedule X” analog feed of national programming if their power failed. “It is a requirement by law that we provide C-band analog clear feed” of the national programming schedule, Caleca added. NPR said the network couldn’t reach WWNO(FM) in New Orleans, while staff at WRKF Baton Rouge said the station was doing fine after being off the air in the morning due to power outages and problems with a backup generator. KRVS(FM) Lafayette was on the air with regular programming. WHIL(FM) Mobile, Ala., as were other local radio stations, is playing a local CBS-affiliate TV signal, “as per arrangement with the transmitter contractor,” NPR said. WJSU Jackson, Miss., was on the air, it added.
Katrina Slams Cable Systems in South; Many Without Service
Cable customers in Ala., La., and Miss. were without service Mon. as Hurricane Katrina’s winds of more than 100 miles per hour and severe flooding caused power outages and felled lines, industry officials said. Officials at Cable One, Comcast and Cox said it was too early to say how long it will take to restore service. Harsh weather hobbled attempts to gauge damage, let alone begin restoring service, officials said. In many areas, landline and wireless phone services aren’t working or are limited, further constraining damage assessments, company officials said.
Contingency plans call for cable operators to get help from cable crews from areas outside the storm’s strike zone. Cox may call in crews from the southeast U.S. and elsewhere, a spokesman said. Comcast probably will seek crews from La. and Miss., a spokesman said. But no plans could be carried out until it was safe to venture outside. Most cable employees in Mobile, Ala.; Biloxi and Gulfport, Miss.; New Orleans and Baton Rouge, La., were homebound or had been evacuated. “Our highest priority was to keep [employees] safe and secure,” said Jim Hannan, vp-engineering for Cable One, Miss.’s biggest cable provider. “We know that technicians are in their homes” and may be stuck there by flooding and downed electric lines, he said.
It will be days before cable firms can tally how many customers lack service, companies said. Full restoration of broadband, phone and TV service may take far longer. “We really have a long-term, as opposed to a short-term, problem that we're dealing with,” Hannan said. By 2 p.m. Eastern Mon. in Biloxi and Gulfport, “there is not a single modem that’s online now, and that generally indicates power” problems, Hannan said: “We know that just about every modem we have is down… We're communicating a little bit with the people in town, but it appears the mobile towers are going down.”
About 1/2 of Cox customers in Baton Rouge and New Orleans have no broadband service, the firm’s spokesman said. Phones were working in New Orleans, where Cox has switched service, but residents couldn’t place calls outside New Orleans, he said. About 1/2 of VoIP customers were without service in Baton Rouge. Cox’s 240,000 La. customers away from the hard-hit areas have service.
After the storm, power firms had to repair downed lines and other Katrina-caused problems, perhaps postponing cable repair, cable officials said. Cox may charter helicopters to use in assessing damage while utility crews work to restore power. Once cable technicians reach neighborhoods, they'll likely have to deal with line drops in which a coaxial cable between a house and utility pole falls down. “In a lot of cases, it’s sort of like threading a needle, because you are literally replacing drop after drop, and that can be a little time-consuming,” the Comcast spokesman said, citing the firm’s experience last week in Southern Fla. after Katrina struck. “We're really not going to know the full extent of what we're dealing with until we can get in there,” the Cox spokesman said.