Many outlets' stock photos for their version of this story are of much, much heftier towers than what was actually stolen. CNN's story has what they attribute as a photo of the actual shack and the base of the tower. It's still a pretty amazing story, nonetheless.
this post was submitted on 09 Feb 2024
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This is the photo to save a click
Aha! So this is the famous RadioShack!
We've got questions, @guycls got answers.
Well done friend, we'll done.
We'll see what you did there.
You have to give them your phone number before you can steal it.
Not all heroes wear capes. Other save you from ad-ridden websites
on the one hand, i'm really amazed the thieves were able to bring it down without attracting much attention, and were able to complete their work in somewhat short order.
on the other hand, i wonder how remote that station was from civilization.
I mean, it is Alabama. The nearest civilization is Atlanta.
Vest, hardhat, clipboard. You could roll up on the tower in a Little Tikes toy car but if you have those key pieces ready to go, all that scrap metal is as good as yours.
In this case, you also need caution tape and something that beeps like a truck backing up
It's actually PPE and a clipboard, you do need a high vis vest and work boots too. And the more esoteric the activity, the more that strange safety measures will be accepted.
"I'm sorry sir, you can't get close once that alarm stops beeping. And once we start, we can't stop - if that tower isn't in the designed drop off point by the end of the day, we'll both be shut down for weeks while the feds investigate. Technically, this is classified as a strategic resource... Probably some hold over from the cold war, but they treat it like enriched uranium.
We're taking it to an unmarked military drop off site, if we're not pulling in at the right time with a description of our vehicle, they get real jumpy with the guns.
Look, between me and you, here's what you do.
Here's the number for Corporal Radnok - he's got his head on his shoulders, and if you give him a heads up before you go through official channels he'll help sort out this mess. He's a real solution oriented guy - he'll cuss and yell, then he'll try to work it out quietly. Quietly is good - he'll do damage control, he'll pay to get this fixed before it runs up the chain, and that's how we get you back online next week instead of next quarter.
Call him between 6-8pm, after he gets home and before he's in bed. This is important - no phones on the base, and he'll be much less accommodating if you wake him up. Then give him a day to chew out the right people, then go through the official channels and we'll have you sorted the next day.
If you want to play it by the book, everyone is going to fight you every step of the way, and the blame game is going to go on for weeks, then eventually someone upstairs will hear about it, and it'll become a whole thing. Maybe you get a few bucks, but it'll only be a few and it'll be painful.
All the same to me though - we get paid either way. But if you're going to go through Radnok I can leave my schedule open"
Rattle off something like that, and you can steal it with the owners watching. No one knows what the laws are, literally no one.
But if you don't have enough PPE, you're fucked
Yeah, I mean, 200 feet of anything just doesn't fit in the back of a pickup truck.
you clearly are not a redneck.
true: a couple of weeks back, heard a guy telling somebody on CB that he and his friend found an antenna tower section on the side of the road and took it home on a mustang.
I can easily fit a few 61 meters yarns in my backpack
Either it is a construction with bolts you can remove to turn it into smaller segments, or you cut it into smaller pieces with an angle grinder.
From the photo it is clear that they weren't getting the mast there with a special transporter. that would be way to expensive.
I work for a local radio station that has a few remote transmitter sites. They widen the broadcast area or put out specific frequencies for that area. Annoyingly, this happens more often than you’d think.
Over the years we’ve had about a handful of transmitters stolen. We’ll get complaints about poor reception or a frequency being off air and we send a tech guy out. And sure enough, the transmitter’s completely gone.
Of course it’s all insured, but it tales a few days to get the new gear and install it. That costs us listenership and potential ad revenue.
Usually the thefts are done by people who run pirate radio stations. Because if you’re doing crimes already, one more doesn’t make a difference. They use the stolen transmitter to set up their own remote site so they don’t get caught. We’ve had gear recovered by the police when they discovered pirate station locations.
The transmitter, sure, I can see that, but a 200 foot tower?
We haven't had OUR towers stolen per se, but we have had people strip wires and lightning strike protection stuff from them when the scrap metal prices soared years ago. Most of our towers are close-ish to populated areas, so I doubt it's worth the risk to hang out for a few hours to dismantle one. I could see someone stealing one of it's remote enough and given enough time.
Where are pirate radio stations still a thing? And that cops deal with?
Here in the Netherlands, pirate radio is definitely still a thing. As long as radio has been around, people have tried to regulate it. And if something's regulated, people are bound to ignore and break those rules.
Our own local station actually has its roots in pirate radio. Back in 1994, a group of local pirates got together and formed a legit, licensed FM radio station. The reason being that those pirates got caught frequently. They figured going legit would be cheaper than constantly paying fines and having equipment seized.
Even in 2024, pirate radio still exists. In 2023, the police and Dutch telecoms agency caught 114 illegal stations. When someone finds an illegal transmitter, police get involved. In some cases, that's also due to safety issues. There have been cases where the pirates put the equipment in trees, surrounded by asbestos as a deterrent to dismantling it. That's actual, legitimate crime that endangers people. When caught, they can get fined up to 45.000 euros.
Now, you might be thinking: why even risk that? Why be a pirate when you can just set up a completely legal online station? Online radio gets you an even wider audience without all the risk. But to the pirates, that risk, the illegal nature, is part of what draws them to it. Most pirates aren't assholes, thankfully, and they frequently run nicer, more modern equipment than the stuff we use. As long as they keep off legit FM frequencies, we don't really have beef with them doing their thing.
I haven't heard about pirate radio in the U.S. in years though. So I don't think that's the case here.
Makes sense. Here in the Netherlands, it's quite densely populated. You only need a very small antenna and not much power to reach other people. I know a guy who's a pirate. He has a telescoping antenna fixed to the back of his house that he can raise up when transmitting. He can reach everyone in his city of about 24.000 people, even with relatively low power. When he's not using it, the antenna isn't visible to anyone.
In the US you'd need a lot more power and a bigger tower to reach people, which means easier detection.
Part of that is how quickly the US will find the stations. The FCC won't let you be.
I briefly worked the telephone support line for a radio scanner manufacturer a few years ago and had an FCC field agent call to confirm a couple of things before they purchased several to scan for pirate radio stations
How in God's name does a person simply steal a 65 m transmitter?? Do they not bolt that thing to the building or to the pavement?
With a big wrench
Cut the cables and the bolts will break.
At least y'all had the sense to be insured.
Even so, it's a pain in the ass involving police reports, there's a deductible, the equipment needs to be special order, etc. etc. Not to mention the week or two of complaints you get. But yeah, insurance is good to have when an FM transmitter can cost anywhere between 3000 and 16000 euros depending on wattage and features. The remote ones are at the cheap end of the scale, but you're still looking at about 4 grand when all other costs are factored in if you didn't have the insurance.
It's less of a difficulty than you think. I worked at a TV station and our old tower that was in a farmer's field was replaced by one in town and we all watched the tower get knocked down. Took about 2 minutes. Just cut the guide cables and it falls.
The part that took a while was figuring out what to cut in what order so that no one got hurt. But if you're just there to steal it, you're probably a lot less worried about that.
Guy wires, not guide.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guy-wire
They call them that because it's what guys use to erect their radio masts. /j
Yeah well, I'm stupid.
Not stupid, you just learned something new. And learning is always worth celebrating.
For anyone interested, I was wondering if there was other motivation than "just theft" or for pirate reuse.
The station's webpage and Facebook seem benign, they do feed national news on their site through ABC so the top 2 stories are how the lakes are too warm for ice and a police issue in NY, so they seem, unbiased? But not in a way that would get them targetted by unsavory individuals. No idea what on-air content looks like, but it just seems like people who like oldies and try to keep the community informed. Good on them.
A shame LoTT doesn't use a radio tower... Just sayin...
Honestly I'm not even mad, just impressed
Fun fact: 200-foot radio towers are free. You can take them home. I have 257 200-foot radio towers.
Can't have shit in Decatur!
I putting all my beans on meth futures.
That's so funny, I just put all my meth into bean futures. I'm going legit.
I call Rockapella to the stand.
You've got the crook!
But do you have- The warrant... the warrant...
And in the latest news from Steeplechase...
Somebody will get that reference.
One theory I saw online was that they had quietly turned off the AM transmitter to save money (AM transmitters use a lot of energy apparently) and therefore didn't see on their monitoring when it was stolen
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