October 3-10, 2002
KDUH-TV, North of Scottsbluff, Nebraska
It may seem as though "Tower Site of the Week" has
been everywhere in the last few years, but in truth, your intrepid
editor still has many hundreds of broadcast sites around the
country that are so remote even he hasn't reached them yet. That
was borne home just a week or so ago, when word came of the collapse
of the nearly 2000-foot tower of KDUH-TV (Channel 4) in Scottsbluff,
Nebraska.
 
Sadly, two tower workers were killed in the September 24 collapse,
which came as the ABC affiliate was preparing its tower to accomodate
an additional antenna for KDUH-DT (Channel 7). And as we looked
at the pictures of the tower post-crash, we realized that this
was one distant corner of Nebraska (five hours or so west of
Omaha, three hours east of Denver) indeed. Plotting the site
on the map, we found it to be a good 10 miles from even the nearest
major road, northeast of Scottsbluff and west of Alliance in
southern Box Butte County.
But never underestimate Tower Site's readers...just a few
days later, we received e-mail from a reader who wishes to remain
anonymous. He had family reasons to be visiting western Nebraska
this past July, and made his way over the dirt roads to capture
what were probably the last pictures ever taken of Nebraska's
tallest tower. He generously offered them to us to share them
with you, and we're grateful for that.
KDUH, by the way, stood for "Duhamel" Broadcasting,
which owns this station as well as KOTA-TV in Rapid City, S.D.,
a few hours to the north. There's quite an irony in this tower's
collapse coming as part of DTV installation; the Duhamel family
has been loudly protesting in Washington against the unfunded
mandate of DTV conversion, arguing that it's an expense these
small stations in this incredibly rural part of the country can't
bear. Now viewers who depended on KDUH as one of only three reliable
local TV signals in far western Nebraska (the others being KSTF,
channel 10 in Scottsbluff, relaying CBS from KGWN in Cheyenne,
Wyoming and KTNE-TV, channel 13 in Alliance, carrying Nebraska
Educational Television) are down to two signals while KDUH rebuilds
its tower. In the meantime, KDUH is feeding area cable systems
directly, as well as reaching in-town viewers in Scottsbluff
and Chadron on translators K02NT and K02NY, respectively.
One more quick bit of midwestern tall-tower trivia: While
KDUH was the tallest tower in Nebraska, there are a few sticks
elsewhere in the region that rise just a few feet higher, right
to the FAA limit of 2063 feet. KVLY-TV (Channel 11) in Fargo,
N.D. is the very tallest, at the limit itself. A few miles away,
KXJB-TV (Channel 4) in Valley City, N.D. rises 2060 feet. KXJB's
tower collapsed in 1998 and was rebuilt shortly afterward. No,
Tower Site hasn't been to the Fargo area, either...but we will,
and you'll see it here.
In the meantime, tune in again next Thursday as we take you
to a site so new, it wasn't even on the air yet when we visited!
 Like
last week's WTIC picture? It's one of the more than a dozen
Tower Site images featured in the 2003 Tower Site Calendar, coming
this fall from Tower Site of the Week and fybush.com.
If you liked last year's edition, you'll love this one: higher-quality
images (in addition to Avon Mountain, this year's edition includes
Providence's WHJJ; Mount Mansfield, Vermont; Buffalo's WBEN;
KOMA in Oklahoma City; the legendary WSM, Nashville; Brookmans
Park, England; WPAT, Paterson; Four Times Square, New York and
more), more dates in radio history, a convenient hole for hanging
- and we'll even make sure all the dates fall on the right days!
This year's calendar will go to press in late October, and
if you order now, you'll have yours in hand by mid-November,
in plenty of time for the holidays. And this year, you can order
with your Visa, MasterCard, Discover or American Express by using
the handy link below!
Better yet, here's an incentive to make your 2003 NERW/Site
of the Week subscription pledge a little early: support NERW/fybush.com
at the $60 level or higher, and you'll get this lovely calendar
for free! How can you go wrong? (Click here
to visit our Support page, where you can make your NERW contribution
with a major credit card...)
You can also order by mail; just send a check for $16
per calendar (NYS residents add 8% sales tax), shipping included,
to Scott Fybush, 92 Bonnie Brae Ave., Rochester
NY 14618.
Thanks for your support!
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