The plot is based loosely on the saga of an actual former pirate station, Radio Caroline, that was founded by an offbeat Irish entrepreneur named Ronan O'Rahilly, the inspiration for the character portrayed by Bill Nighy. As this 2009 article from the Independent, a British newspaper, details, O'Rahilly obtained a 63-ton (57-metric ton), Danish passenger ferry, the MV Frederica, and renamed it Caroline, after the daughter of the late U.S. President John F. Kennedy. Give us a sense of the universe of this problem given that it is such a priority for this FCC to crack down on it. Listening to pirate radio is perfectly legaland frequently an ear-opening experience. There is a lot of misconception about what a low power transmitter is. Marshal Service actually and that allows us to go in with the U.S. We also get the other federal agencies involved, the Department of Justice, U.S. Attorney's Office, where we can seek a warrant. Total Views 29,203 (Older Stats) ITEMS. Sweet! MR. DOMBROWSKI: And so that's not practical for somebody that wants to operate a radio station to cover an entire community. MR. DOMBROWSKI: Yes, it may not start to cause interference as soon as you open up and out of the box and operate it, but over time with the heating up of the electronics inside it starts to malfunction and cause what we call spurius emissions where signals are operating outside your intended band and cause interference to other radio services. April 8, 2015 - 10:43 am. That happens a lot. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: So, David, you are uniquely qualified to talk about this topic and to help listeners to understand just how qualified you are how did you get to this current position at the FCC. The FCC argued that we were here to regulate the airwaves. Just browse the pirate radio category: https://swling.com/blog/category/pirate-radio/. To determine the wavelength of your signal in inches, divide 11811 by your transmitter's frequency in megahertz (MHz). MR. SWARZTRAUBER: They could stream it just like this podcast we're doing. If we are out there just gathering evidence for the first time our agents will go to the door, they will identify themselves with their badge. So that is quite a large area. While this reality is not surprising, we . Pirate stations want listeners to discover them, so they broadcast in various watering holes.. Marshals went in with us and we seized the equipment. The U.S. . Answer (1 of 14): Why I am qualified to answer this question. So a transmitter that complies with the Part 15 requirements has a very small operating range, about 100 feet. "Caroline now has two stations, one playing album music and one playing the original pop music for which the station is remembered," Moore explains. "In Haiti during the Duvalier regime, people depended on radio to get news from independent sources off the island. Many of you have suggested in the past that the SWLing Post join an affiliate links program. David, thanks so much for joining. HowStuffWorks may earn a small commission from affiliate links in this article. For many of the people in those communities, who may not be able to afford a computer or a smartphone and a broadband connection, pirate radio is an affordable medium. Some of those, you know, if you tune your dial and find some spaces where there is some dead air, well those are intentionally put there in order so that stations don't cause interference to each other. If you live in other parts of the world, pirate hunting can pose serious DX challenges. MR. DOMBROWSKI: Yes. And so these transmitters that they are purchasing and pirate stations are using do not go through the equipment process, the equipment authorization process, and that is a problem. "Pirate radio continues to exist in the internet age for a variety of reasons," John Nathan Anderson, a broadcasting scholar and author who is working on a book about pirate radio, explains via email. We have language to kind of consider them an operator, so they could be liable for a fine and we do issue them a warning letter. Carl McIntire, a fundamentalist preacher who briefly broadcast fire-and-brimstone sermons from a converted minesweeper off the coast of New Jersey, as this 2014 NJ.com article details. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Yes. They also cover your wireless routers in your house. Collection Info. Why? I decoded this Wolverine Radio SSTV QSL on the SSTV iOS App. It could be computers, antennas, coaxial cables. Moreover, summer conditions in the North American 43 meter band are often much noisier, thus pirates know theyll be fighting static crashes to be heard during the summer months. We want them to be as descriptive as possible. Director Richard Curtis' 2009 comedy-drama stars the late Philip Seymour Hoffman as The Count, a disc jockey for an unlicensed rock radio station that broadcast from a rusty, decrepit ship off the British coast in the mid-1960s, defying government authorities to spin the rock records that weren't allowed on the BBC at the time. But the easiest way to file a complaint is go online. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: So what is the current state of pirate radio? So we try to shut down, you know, that equipment coming in to the purchasers. Right now it is $10,000 per day per occurrence. Airchecks from unauthorized broadcast radio stations throughout the years. Gimme Radio (for online listeners) Gimme Radio is one of the more modern American rock radio stations available today. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Well at least you are recycling. And that's it, we will catch you next time. Are we talking about U.S. marshals with machine guns kicking in doors, are we talking about politely knocking on a door and saying, hey, guys, your time is up, we found you, you know, what's the image that essentially you see when this goes down in your experience or is there kind of a spectrum of different cases, some are a little bit more intense than others? MR. SWARZTRAUBER: That's some great local cooperation right there. Marshal Service and seize all of the equipment that is associated with the operation of a radio station, really anything physically connected to the transmitter. MR. DOMBROWSKI: Right. Each issue also contains a CD of sound clips from various pirates, several articles about the state of pirate radio, and other relevant info. Airchecks from unauthorized broadcast radio stations throughout the years. That's really helpful because then we can note when to send the agents out. MR. DOMBROWSKI: Sure. Be specific. The government authorities in charge of the surveillance of the radio-electric spectrum can use the PROWATCH instruments to detect and locate the pirate and irregular broadcast stations of radio and TV. Pirate cards are among the most unusual of QSL cards, that often incorporate obscure or vintage imageryhumor, horror, or other graphic oddityor cast the pirate in a unique character representation. Find this podcast in the iTunes store or Google Play or wherever you get your podcasts. Our agents are pretty smart on the tricks. Hover over one of the three pirate radio neighborhood zones (the center zone has the most stations) and click for a list of stations that broadcast to those areas. So what is the state of pirate radio in the U.S. and how is the FCC taking it on? I believe this is why authorities like the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) place shortwave pirates comparatively lower on their enforcement priority list. "He convinced me to not stay on as Bond I'd be in danger of becoming part of the Establishment," Lazenby wrote on in an Instagram tribute after O'Rahilly's death in April 2020, noting that he had no regrets about taking that advice. MR. DOMBROWSKI: Yes. In the U.S. the most famous example of a Pirate Radio station was Mexico's XERF. A new, raw, grassroots kind of pirate radio exploded from 1992 onwards. I was still a teenager. Many of our links now function as affiliate links. (Disclaimer). I know at least in our region we get them everywhere. "He created Radio Caroline operating in that way and the station was at once called a 'pirate,'" Moore says. Now some folks might be asking themselves this is all great, I totally agree that pirate radio is bad, and I think that you should absolutely go after it, but what about the First Amendment? Pirates tend to occupy swatches of the shortwave spectrum that are relatively quiet, avoid intentionally broadcasting on top of one another, and typically operate at fairly low power. So I never left, I've been here for over 25 years. 1. Do you hear it on the weekends or is only a station that operates during the weekends? Our agents will contact you. Please support this website by adding us to your whitelist in your ad blocker. It is illegal for companies to market equipment that hasn't gone through what we call a certification process, equipment authorization process, where they get a company to look at their transmitter to make sure it complies with our technical rules and doesn't have potential to cause interference to other radio services. The most popular frequency used by U.S. and Canadian pirate radio stations is 6925 kHz, transmitting in the AM or upper sideband (USB) modes. We have been at in rem seizures we call them where the U.S. marshals come with the local law enforcement and there is 20 of them and they have to secure the whole block off, the have to secure the building for our protection. Having that exposure helped boost the careers of scores of British bands whose music eventually made it to America. These guys aren't blowing off their listeners like the other radio stations. URL Here: https://dkng.co/rogue-----For entertainment purposes only. Bruce will host a new daily show for Bauer's station Greatest Hits Radio, taking his iconic PopMaster game with him. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Right. "The government decided that radio was too influential as a means of mass communication to be in private hands," Peter Moore explains in an email. All you need is a location to host the antenna and access to electricity unless you've got batteries, then just the location.". MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Ten times as much, that's big, yes. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: It's not working properly and that's why it's going into air traffic control. This means that by clicking on these links, a small percentage of the purchase price for goods you purchase from these sellers will help support our sites running costs. PIRATE RADIO Once you remove the idea of pirate radio from its mythology, you. So how do you escalate the situation, you know, what tools do you have to say, okay, we're not getting cooperation let's take this up a notch? 19. r/HamRadio. After the reorganization and modernization of the field I then became the Regional Director and manage several offices now. So they thought that was a way for them to avoid detection by hopping from building to building and frequency to frequency. 40. r/HamRadio. The price of the equipment is $2,960.51. Now you usually get one of your top, you know, first or second choice. Before we talk about where to hunt pirates, however, we need to talk about the necessary equipmenti.e., your radio and antenna. The Moody Blues are one example of this." Enter Ronan O'Rahilly, who learned that the U.K. government's jurisdiction ended 3 miles (5 kilometers) off the coast, and that stations from other countries already were exploiting that loophole by putting transmitters on offshore ships, according to Moore. The FRW is an email-only newsletter devoted to the hobby of pirate radio listening, and is distributed free to those who contribute. Join. That doesn't prohibit somebody from filing an anonymous complaint, we still take those. Radio plays such an important role when you talk about hurricanes striking or other natural disasters, people turn to their local broadcast, including radio for information, and to have that be interfered with is a public safety concern let alone the FAA issues which are very serious. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Is that a point of pride for you from Philadelphia? We also would be required to file a report to Congress annually on our enforcement activities in pirate radio. MR. DOMBROWSKI: No, and some of these are in high crime areas where there is a lot of drugs. The reason is, no matter what time of the year it is, no matter what the space weather (yes, I said space weather) or conditions of the ionosphere are--FM stations are relatively few, local, and always broadcast in the same spots on the FM dial. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Yes, in those dense urban areas because the FM band is already pretty clogged up with legitimate stations that might be one of the reasons that people throw up their hands and say, well, I guess I'm just do an illegal station because I am frustrated by the legal process for getting a station, but that is not a justification in any sense of the word. Well we did go to the courts, we got the warrant, and the U.S. MR. DOMBROWSKI: You know, that's hard to say. I mean they have a significant financial investment in their stations, they have gone through proper FCC process, and now they are competing for listeners with stations that did not go through that process, did not necessarily bear the same financial burden to get up and running, and they are not maybe just competing with listeners, as we have mentioned we've been competing with, they are competing with advertisers as well. March 13 2022 . More areas, more just the urban areas. Select a station from the list and it will play on the tuner. So we get complaints from the FAA quite often, more than a few times a month in New York, and that the pilots are flying over the city and they are trying to communicate with air traffic control and all of a sudden they pick up a radio station. Some pirates have even shown in in the SWBC bands, including 49, 31 and 25 meters. Keep in mind that pirates are relatively low-power broadcasters. And an overall limit of $2 million. The library's newest additions include deep historical resources and contemporary reporting about the world of radio. Where the "modern" history of pirate radio seems to begin, though, is in the 1960s when pirate radio operators would get on the air to spread their music to a wider audience. Loggings are in real time and there are very fewif anyoff-topic posts. ACTIVITY. South America was strong for a while in the 90s, but that has also fallen silent. It's about $200,000 worth of equipment. In 1967, Parliament enacted the Marine Broadcasting Offenses Act, which made offshore broadcasts from ships illegal, on the pretext that their broadcast interfered with marine weather radio and distress signals, as this contemporaneous New York Times account notes. It's covert surveillance equipment. MR. DOMBROWSKI: So we have two ways to file a complaint. Total . We do follow the bread crumbs to where it leads us and a lot of times we are able to identify the operators and where the studio is and have success in getting the station shut down. So not only interference, but we also have issues of interference to other radio services. This station was operated in Pennsauken, New Jersey, which is right across the river from Philadelphia, and it covered the entire Philadelphia area. Very old school, and cheap enough for anyone's budget. ( Disclaimer) Transcript: MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Welcome to "More Than 7 Dirty Words," the official FCC podcast. Across the country FCC officials are working to identify and take action against illegal unlicensed radio operators using frequencies allocated for legitimate radio operators that are causing interference and other issues. If you have information about a pirate radio station, you can notify the FCC by calling 888-CALLFCC or filing a complaint online at https://consumercomplaints.fcc.gov. The Who actually paid homage to Radio Caroline and other offshore broadcasters by parodying them on their 1967 concept album "The Who Sell Out," as music historian John Atkins has written. "By playing nonstop current pop music in a situation where this had never before been available, Caroline had within months a larger audience than all the BBC stations combined," Moore explains. Use promo code ROGUE to get a shot at MILLIONS OF DOLLARS in total prizes! MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Yes. We do let stations operate with low power transmitters but they have to comply with the technical requirements of Part 15 of our rules. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Oh, yes. Do you hear it any other time, you know, at night time? Be careful to. Interestingly, the antenna was so high up on the tower we had to bring a bucket truck in from a fire station and raise it --. Set up your Raspberry Pi You'll need to get Raspbian, the Linux-based operating system for the Raspberry Pi. This metal-focused platform is available entirely online, so you can access the music from a lot of different locations, even though the station is based in San Francisco. MR. DOMBROWSKI: No, it doesn't have -- It's not marked with pizza delivery guy either. Well joining me to discuss this topic is David Dombrowski, Regional Director for Region One in the FCC Enforcement Bureau. Multiply the answer from #1 by the fraction of wavelength of your antenna's design (most antennas are 1/2 (.5) or 1/4 (.25) wave; the popular Comet is a 5/8 (.625) wave antenna). You remove the idea of pirate radio in the 90s, but we have. Also fallen silent transmitter that complies with the technical requirements of Part 15 requirements has very!, we still take those our enforcement activities in pirate radio exploded from onwards. Crime areas where there is a lot of misconception about what a low power transmitters they... 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