Radio studio on life support is lifeline for Punta Gorda

By CHRIS TISCH, Times Staff Writer

Published August 17, 2004

 

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PUNTA GORDA - The radio studios were silent for less than five hours.

 

The last to leave the microphone was Admin Timko, whose on-air handle is Admin T. He fled just as Hurricane Charley's winds started to bend the trees Friday afternoon.

 

That evening, general manager Mike Moody returned to the building. The roof was shredded, the ceiling collapsed. But one studio, no bigger than a walk-in closet, was in working order.

 

"There was no sound. Nothing," Moody said. "There was only silence."

 

So he started broadcasting. A generator provided the power. Moody plugged a phone cord into a fax outlet and got a dial tone. He put the phone to the microphone and let callers unravel their terrible tales of storm survival.

 

Since then, the radio studio in Punta Gorda, the only one based in Charlotte County, has become a lifeline for residents searching for information to help them cope with the storm's aftermath.

 

Moody manages five Clear Channel stations, including country, rock and talk formats, now broadcasting from the tiny studio. They were first to report Sunday that school was canceled for two weeks. They were the first to say Monday that upcoming local elections were kaput.

 

They offer phone numbers, locations where food and water are available, even information on where people can bring their horses. The building has become a trading post of information.

 

At the center of all this is Moody, a 49-year-old father of three whose Port Charlotte home was nicked by Charley.

 

He first had to get a signal out. His towers were undamaged, but the link to them was rattled. And the roof was gone.

 

"If the stuff gets wet, we're toast," Moody said.

 

Moody asked for roof repair help over the air, hoping builders would come forward. When builders could give him no definitive answers Monday, he cried.

 

"Sorry, guys," he said, wiping his eyes with a paper towel.

 

While keeping the station going has been stressful, emergency officials have praised its work, saying it serves as rescuers' best mouthpiece to the public.

 

"It is phenomenally important," said Charlotte schools superintendent Dave Gaylor. "It is the only lifeline people have."

 

Moody said emergency officials hired a plane to fly over the county pulling a banner encouraging residents to listen to his stations for the latest information.

 

As the plane buzzed over the studio late Monday afternoon, Moody craned his head and watched it through the holes in the roof. He smiled.

 

http://www.sptimes.com/2004/08/17/Weather/..._on_life_.shtml

Well, these Clear Channel Radio Stations are the only major commercial radio stations in Charlotte County. They have done an incredible job because people in Charlotte had no TV and the Fort Myers radio stations didn't reach up there as well due to storm damage.

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/9447314.htm

HURRICANE CHARLEY | THE AFTERMATH

 

 

Spared radio station is a beacon for those still without power

 

BY AMY DRISCOLL

 

adriscoll@herald.com

 

 

PUNTA GORDA - With a temporary roof, a single cellphone and nothing but a generator to run the equipment, a country music station in hurricane-ravaged Southwest Florida has become a lifeline for residents still without power after a week.

 

''You're angels,'' one caller tells them. ``Charley's angels.''

 

Operating in a trashed building without a working phone line, the DJs -- and general manager and news director and even a volunteer ham radio operator -- have been running a round-the-clock news operation patched together with ingenuity and sheer will.

 

''We're doing it 24/7 since Charley hit and we'll keep doing it as long as we need to,'' said Bob Alexander, news director for Kix Country, WKIX-FM (92.9), and four other ClearChannel stations in the area. ``There are a lot of people out there with no power. They can't watch TV. . . . A lot of them don't even have phones. All they have are their battery-operated radios.''

 

The proof of his words is right outside the station's doors: Devastation in every direction.

 

The radio building and its miraculously still-standing towers are in one of the hardest hit areas of Punta Gorda, surrounded by mobile home parks that are flattened and tattered and smashed.

 

Inside, DJs are closeted in the one air-conditioned booth, dispensing critical information for a post-hurricane world -- where to get water and ice, how to file an insurance claim, what number to use for the Federal Emergency Management Agency. The program is simulcast on other local ClearChannel stations.

 

If they don't know for sure, they'll tell you. ''This is still wing-and-a-prayer stuff,'' general manager Michael Moody reminded listeners Thursday. ``We're all just doing the best we can.''

 

FIXING FLATS

 

A worker from Harbor Nissan drops by to be certain word gets out that his dealership is fixing flat tires -- a common problem when driving in hurricane debris -- for free. ''You got a flat, come on in,'' Lee Browning tells the radio jocks.

 

He begins to leave, then turns back and tips his baseball cap: ``By the way, you guys are doing a great job. God bless.''

 

When Charley began bearing down last week, the station kept broadcasting -- with one DJ in the station and another at the Charlotte County Emergency Operations Center -- until both had to flee.

 

Even then, the station was only off the air from 3:20 p.m. till about 8 p.m. the night Charley struck. When employees made their way back to the building, they found it had lost its roof, along with power and phone lines. But a phone attached to the fax machine was coaxed to life and the broadcasting equipment in the interior of the building had mostly escaped damage.

 

They began to broadcast.

 

''That first night, we talked all night long with people. Everyone wanted to tell the story of how they got through Charley,'' said Jeff Collins, a DJ who usually works for WCCF, an AM news-talk station owned by ClearChannel. ``The phone never stopped until it died.''

 

They switched to a cellphone -- one belonging to an employee -- and kept going.

 

Six days later, the roof is on, more or less, and a donated air-conditioner hums in the booth. In what used to be the lobby, donations are piled: food, work gloves, hats. A Bose radio, running on generator power, blares the broadcast into the room.

 

On the front porch, ham radio operator John Duarte listens for new information on the Charlotte County emergency operations frequency to pass on to listeners. In the distance, chain saws have begun to whine.

 

NO PROFITEERS

 

And the station has become an automatic stop for anyone who wants to get the word out about, well, practically anything. A steady stream of people -- ministers, school officials, students and neighbors -- make their way uncertainly past mounds of debris to come inside.

 

''One of our biggest challenges now,'' Collins said with a smile, ``is to make sure we don't let people use this to profit.''

 

That means you can't promote your business or your latest CD. But when Chuck Weeks, a technician for Charlotte County Schools, drove up in a yellow school bus with information about work crews cleaning up the homes of hurricane victims for free, he immediately was granted air time. ''I'm just glad the station is here to get the word out,'' Weeks said.

 

Thursday, the station interviewed FEMA director Michael Brown by phone from Orlando. Only trouble: The station still has no land lines operating.

 

So they did what they've been doing for six days. They called him on the cellphone, asked him questions and then held the cellphone to the radio microphone so listeners could hear his answers.

 

''Normally we would just conference people in, so they could ask questions,'' said Moody. ``But this is not normal.''