4ZB Staff Go Full Speed Ahead To Defeat Gale

Radio Record, Volume XII, Issue 33, 27 January 1939, Page 22

4ZB Staff Go Full Speed Ahead To Defeat Gale

7VEN a "70-mile-an-hour_ gale, though it did its best, could not keep 4ZB off the air. It ali happened the other day, and it started in the lunch hour, when members of the staff were scattered far and wide. The gale removed from its moorings an outsize in trees on the Higheliff road near the Karitene Hospital, This fell across the power lines, and completely severed communication _ between 4ZB’s studio and the transmitter at Highcliff. Alert staff at the transmiiter put on a standby programme so that there was no break in the broadcast. At the studio were scenes of activity. From here, there and everywhere, announcers and technicians were mustered and bundled into cars together with records, features and copy. Then began a hair-raising trip to the transmitter, the cars moving at a speed which would have turned a traffic policeman’s hair gray. At the best of times this road is not by any means perfect; in the fierce gale, and with the Otago Harbour below looking like the Bay of Biscay in a bad temper, the drive was like a nightmare. — Organisation was _ excellent. With amazing rapidity, engineers’ quarters at the transmitter were converted into a studio, and the kitchen table, equipped with microphone, became the announcer’s desk, The programme went on, up to the minute. The wind-blown staff even had afternoon tea, almost up to the minute. Rapidity and efficiency which marked the entire incident, typi cal of 4Z2B, were such that listen: ers would not have known there was any trouble at all had not the station director put over a brief announcement, That same evening transmission from the city studio was resumed at 7.45.