Topic: KWO35 Out Of Service

[stevenpomp]

My local NWR transmitter in NY, KWO35 has been out of service for a few days now. Their web site http://www.nws.noaa.gov/nwr/outages/outages.php confirms the outage. Just wondering if this happens regularly & for how long. Since I am relatively new to monitoring this station on a daily basis since purchasing a few weather alert radios it is a bummer none of the radios work now. Channel 7 162.550 is the only channel I receive at my location.
Thanks for any input.
Steve

[vreihen]

I saw the alert from NWS a few days ago, and was shocked that KWO35 was back on the air for regular broadcasts!

For those you don't know the story, the National Weather Service's NOAA radio transmitter in the nation's most populated city was taken off the air back in 2014, due to interference it was causing to the Coast Guard's communications system on the primary marine VHF calling channel 16 through a common antenna that they shared at Rockefeller Center.  The National Weather Service shut the transmitter down to prevent further interference, and only powered it up for weather emergencies and interference testing.  At one point, they were testing it at low power...but it was still causing interference.

Wow!  It looks like they made a lot of changes that I did not hear about:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KWO35

Anyway, this should give you a good idea about the operating reliability and historical outages for one of the nation's most important NOAA radio transmitters.....

[stevenpomp]

Thanks for that link. What a history of outages & interference etc. I hope I haven't wasted my money on these weather alert radios. If seems very iffy whether or not I'll be able to utilize these receivers with any regularity. Bummer.

[vreihen]

I received an alert this afternoon saying the KWO35 was back on the air.

As someone who is never home, I have found that a Weather Underground subscription was worth the money...just to receive the NWS alerts via email to my smart phone.  Hence, how I knew that KWO35 was off the air.  I have subscribed to alerts for both home and the coastal city in the southeast where my mother lives, so I know what's going on down there and can call if there is something happening that they need to take action for.....

[vreihen]

Oh, I should point out that a Weather Underground subscription is 100% free (including email alerts) if you own a personal weather station and are sending data to them.....

[stevenpomp]

    Good info about Weather Underground. Thanks again. Yes, KWO35 is back up again. Lets hope it remains so.

[PaulKTF]

I just wanted to give everyone here an update on KWO35. It will be coming back in the Fall:

https://nwschat.weather.gov/p.php?pid=201906121909-KOKX-NOUS41-PNSOKX

[vreihen]

That's good news for the largest city in the country to finally have a working NOAA weather radio feed for its residents as well as the harbor and coastline!  I guess that tower space on the Empire State Building (ESB) is finally freeing up, now that One World Trade Center is open as the preferred transmitter location and stations are moving back.

For those who don't know, many of NYC's TV and radio stations had moved their operations over from the Empire State Building to the old World Trade Center building when it was constructed.  Besides killing at least one transmitter engineer, 9/11 sent everyone who lost their WTC broadcast site scrambling for space on the ESB, Rockefeller Center, and the old Alpine Tower across the river in NJ.....