Proving The Power Of AM Radio in Emergencies

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As the fight for AM radio’s place in the auto dashboard continues, Radio Ink is speaking with those who know the band’s importance most – the operators, managers, and talent who have seen AM’s power in an emergency. Today we talk with Cromwell Media’s Rob Nichols. Rob is News Director at Cromwell’s Owensboro, KY cluster, and worked there during an ice storm in 2009 that left many in the area without power in dangerous conditions.

Radio Ink: What is your experience with AM’s power in an emergency?

Rob Nichols: I started out working in AM radio for another station here in town, which we also own now, WVJS-AM. When people wanted news, they knew to listen to AM. They knew that WVJS was the station that provided it. And it’s still like that today. When people want their information, they’re going to tune in to AM radio.

As for the ice storm, we pretty much knew was coming, but we didn’t know how bad it was going to be. We were ready for it, but we didn’t know how it was going to impact the whole town. As the ice really started to accumulate, being right next to an electric substation here on our street was a big advantage for us. We didn’t lose power here at the radio station for most of that time, even though a lot of people in town did. We stayed on the air, with our generator ready, just in case.

The ice accumulation was really heavy. There were many nights we stood outside during our coverage when the only sounds we heard were tree branches breaking and falling onto things.

Radio Ink: You have a file of letters from residents you all kept about your ice storm coverage. Everyone from the mayor of Owensboro to schoolchildren sent in these letters about how you all helped. It seemed like the whole town turned to AM when the situation escalated.

Rob Nichols: Well, while were we doing it we didn’t think about that. We were just doing our jobs. It wasn’t until after that we started getting all these letters. At the time, we did not know that we were impacting people that much.

When we were live on the air, a lot of times we would sit overnight. I lived at the station during that week. I would get up at two o’clock in the morning and go join one of the other announcers to open up the mic and talk about the situation, give the news, and take calls.

People were looking for propane for their generators. They were looking for all kinds of supplies and we became their conduit for that. Local companies were calling us saying, “Hey, we’ve got a new shipment of propane coming in. Please relay that to your listeners.” And so we didn’t find out until later on how it impacted people and we started getting these letters.

In the very beginning, we were scrambling. We had a lot of live shows during that time with a little tracking from time to time, but we realized we had to go live. We simulcasted when we could – we have a switch in the station where we can simulcast one of our stations on all of them, AMs and FMs. We would hit that switch and go out on all the signals at the same time, letting people know what to do and where to get their supplies.

We started getting calls saying, “Hey guys, you know, we love the competition that y’all have, we like their music and everything, but we’re tuning over to them and they’re not doing anything. And so we’re going to be tuning in to you guys to get our information.” We were just doing our job.

Radio Ink: The ice storm was in 2009. Technology has changed quite a bit since then, but AM remains vital – so much so that Ed Markey and Ted Cruz, two polar opposite politicians came together to keep it in vehicles. Why do you think that AM remains so compelling and important in emergencies?

Rob Nichols: Because it’s basically the news/talk format. A lot of times, make sure there are a lot of music stations. We have two of ours here are music stations. And so it’s one of those things where people think news and talk and info. They think AM – even people who maybe never listened to it otherwise. When something’s going on and they want to know, they’re tuning into the AM band because they know they’re going to find their information there. And I don’t think that’s ever going to go away.

It’s no wonder that these same people raise such alarms about keeping AM in cars. I’m so happy that Ford took a step back and said, “You know what, we need to keep these in the vehicles because people are having a fit about it.”

Radio Ink: AM has certainly had a great deal of good news in the past two weeks. But the fight isn’t close to being done. For the automakers that are still on the fence, what message do you think we as an industry need to be sending to them?

Rob Nichols: AM is relevant. Ask the people that use it as their source of information. A lot of people try to pin AM listeners as older people. Yes, they are still the listeners. But there are a lot of younger people that didn’t even grow up on AM that still know AM is information. That’s what I would tell these automakers on the fence: yes, it is worth keeping.

1 COMMENT

  1. I’m a former AM station owner (WWFL, Clermont, FL). Needless to say, ice was never an issue here, but severe thunderstorms and hurricanes were. I still tune to AM for news in my Chevrolet Bolt EV and notice no audio issues related to the electric drive system.

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