BC-DX TopNews WWDXC #945 BC-DX 945

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(Walter Eibl-D, wwdxc June 09)
ASCENSION ISL Radio Broadcasting on Lonely Ascension Island
The BBC ATLANTIC Relay Station.
Last week here in Wavescan, we presented the story of the several
different radio stations, mediumwave, FM and communication, all located on
lonely Ascension Island, out there in the central Atlantic Ocean, halfway
between South America and Africa. We take up the Ascension story again
this week, and this time, it is the tale of the BBC Atlantic Ocean
Shortwave Relay Station. Here is what happened.
During the year 1961, the BBC sent a team of technical personnel to
Ascension to conduct a feasibility survey; and during the following year,
the British government gave approval for the setting up of a shortwave
relay station on Ascension Island for use in rebroadcasting the
programming from the BBC in London to the many countries in Africa & South
America.
During the following year, as a preliminary to the construction of the
station, Cable & Wireless, C&W, set up a small shortwave station in a
caravan, a trailer home, at English Bay and transmitted a series of test
broadcasts. It is probable that these transmitters were amateur or
communication transceivers with a power output of 1 kW or less.
However, in spite of the low power, these test broadcasts were noted by
international radio monitors in Europe & North America. Unfortunately, C&W
stated that these test broadcasts were of a private nature and they
indicated that they would not issue any QSLs in confirmation.
Work on this massive new project on ascension Island began during the next
year, 1964, and we should remember that everything had to be imported from
England and elsewhere. Ascension was once uninhabited and everyone on the
island has come in from another country. Even children born on the island
are not granted Ascension citizenship, they are considered to be citizens
of their parents' country.
This huge new BBC shortwave station was constructed on the edge of English
Bay, located at the northern tip of Ascension Island. The original plans
called for four transmitters at 250 kW each and a series of twenty
reversible curtain antennas.
Monitoring reports during that era tell us that the first transmitter was
taken into service two years later again, on July 1, 1966 in the BBC
service into Africa. Six months later, the second transmitter was
activated, and early in the following year, all four transmitters were
fully operational. To honor the occasion, the local postal authorities
issued a series of four postage stamps depicting various scenes at the new
station.
A QSL letter from the station in May 1989 stated that another shortwave
transmitter at 250 kW had just been activated, the fifth, and that the
sixth would soon be operational. These two latter transmitters were
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