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Luther radio station heard around the world: Listener from Finland tunes in to KWLC

Date 4/5/2001 12:00 AM | Topic: Features

Early in the morning, around 6 a.m., on Wednesday, Feb. 7, a voice was heard crackling over a radio in Lapland, Finland.

"Good evening and welcome to the alternative voice of Luther College, KWLC 1240 AM."

It was the 10 p.m. sign-on of Luther's own student radio station and the person who heard it was Jim Solatie, the managing director of a market research company in Espoo, Finland, while on a skiing vacation with friends.

On March 5, Shawn Neary ('01), a KWLC music director, received a letter from Solatie documenting how he was able to hear the radio broadcast.

Solatie included an audio tape to verify that he heard the signal and a picture of his family.

"Thank you very much for your programme. It was most interesting to listen to your station here in Finland! I am 33 years old, a father of two lovely and lively kids...my favourite hobbies are sports and listening to foreign radio stations," wrote Solatie.

According to Solatie, a member of a radio listening club, the cottage he rented in Lapland was outfitted with eight antennas, each a kilometer long. He also used a high power communications receiver tuned to the 1240 kHz frequency used by KWLC.

According to Bruce Larson, technical media specialist and KWLC technician, this hobby, called DX-listening, involves picking up AM signals from around the globe as they bounce off the ionosphere, a layer of Earth's atmosphere, and back down again in a phenomenon called "skip."

"With the kind of antennas he was using, picking up a small signal like ours would not be too difficult," said Larson.

Under layers of static blips and noise, the traditional daily sign-on can be faintly heard on the tape.

"It's definitely a weird feeling," said Neary, who compared it to throwing a message in a bottle out to sea and getting a response. "It's pretty neat to know that someone is interested in what we're doing. It would be nice if more students got that excited about us."

Neary and his fellow DJs are planning to send Solatie a return letter to verify that it was Luther's signal that he heard, along with KWLC bumper stickers for his club and other information about the station.

Emily Wacker ('02) was the DJ on the air at the time Solatie was tuned in.

"We're proud of KWLC and are happy when anybody listens," said Wacker. "It's especially cool when it's someone from halfway around the world."

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Peter Schletty
Chips BackPage Editor

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