Determined not to be blamed for fires due to sparking transmission lines, San Diego Gas & Electric has been turning off electricity prophylactically as Santa Ana winds build in northern and eastern San Diego County. Better to turn off power than have power lines spark in the wind, the theory goes. Outlying radio stations have gone off the air because of it.

We have reports of these radio stations leaving the air October 24 and 25:

• KYDO 96.1 Campo
• KKLJ 100.1 Julian
• KWFN-FM2 97.3 Romona

KPRZ 1210 kHz San Marcos was reportedly able to stay on the air with a generator.

The FCC issued a Public Notice announcing the activation of a voluntary Disaster Information Reporting System in response to shutoffs by California electrical utilities PG&E and SDG&E. They are asking affected FCC licensees to report outages to the Disaster Information Reporting System (DIRS) at https://www.fcc.gov/nors/disaster/. Of course, you’ll need to register with a User ID and password.

The FCC is asking communications providers to report outages from now until “DIRS is deactivated.” San Diego County is included in the “counties of interest” list.

Many thanks to Bob Gonsett for sending us this list of emergency resources, primarily for San Diego County, available on-line:

SDG&E Awareness Info – Excellent to display at your station continuously
SDG&E Yellow Splotch Map – Anticipated power outages
SDG&E Outage Map – Real time info, two fingers to move map
Cal Fire Map
Cal Fire Stats
UCSD HPWREN Mountaintop Web Cams – Click on a thumbnail to enlarge
Inciweb – National safety incidents
Forest Service Fire
SD County Emergency Site

Let’s say you got in early–1949 perhaps–and you now own a highly-regarded communications site on a prominent location where no one else can develop a similar site. Let’s set as a random example, Mt. Soledad in La Jolla, California.

Should you be required by law to share that site with your competitors?

The FCC said so at the end of World War II, 1945, and that rule has remained in effect. And now they’re asking for comments on eliminating it.

Should they? On one hand, there are many more communications sites now to choose from. The likes of American Tower, Crown Castle, InSite, and Vertical Bridge are ready and waiting for you.

On the other hand, sites like Mt. Soledad will remain, as the FCC terms it, “peculiarly suitable for broadcasting.” What’s to keep Scripps and Tegna from excluding Entercom and iHeart from their sites at the end of their leases once the rules are changed?

If you would like to comment on the change, check out the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking FCC 19-106.

Following the exploits of inserting a signal or two or three on 101.1 MHz into San Diego can be a part-time job. KRTH (FM) Los Angeles, the ancient, grandfathered behemoth it remains, covers far outside its home market. Here’s what San Diegans are doing to try to change that:

KVIB-LP San Diego, owned by the World Beat Center, was granted an STA request to remain silent on August 20, 2019. An FCC Minor Modification application dated September 10, 2019, notes a new station location at 3295 Meade Avenue in Normal Heights–a location less encumbered by antenna height limits and with greater surrounding population. [9/19/19 UPDATE – The FCC dismissed the move to Normal Heights due to spacing requirements to the new application by KECR, below, made only days before. –GS]

KECR (AM) requested a translator on 100.1 MHz, but the FCC dismissed that application, saying it violated an international agreement protecting the 2nd adjacent channel XHTY 99.7 in Tijuana. That protection extends to 72 km. They filed September 5, 2019, for 101.1 MHz instead, with a northward radiation pattern from Mt. San Miguel.

KRSP-LP El Cajon was granted a license last year to operate on 101.1 MHz, but La Maestra Clinic, the licensee, later wrote a letter to the FCC stating that in fact, the station had never been constructed or operated and was turning in its license. A later Petition for Reconsideration from another party claiming to be associated with the Clinic wanted the license reinstated. The FCC put an end to that Petition by denying it in a September 10 letter.

It will be interesting to see what happens. Any low power station will be challenged by the magnitude of the KRTH signal.