WWCS Maryland Sister Station Destroyed in Fire
August 19, 2022A Maryland-based sister station of Canonsburg-based WWCS was destroyed in a Thursday morning fire.
WGOP is an adult standards-formatted AM station based in the Delmarva area, and like WWCS, operates at the same frequency of AM 540. Both stations are owned by metro Detroit-based Birach Broadcasting, but WGOP was leased under a long-term time brokerage agreement to Mike Powell, whose Bay Broadcasting owned Ocean City-based WBEY-FM until 2018.
The fire broke out shortly before noon at the station’s studio and transmitter facility on Dunn Swamp Road in Pocomoke City. Firefighters said that the fire originated in the building’s attic area, likely caused by an electrical failure.
Investigators say that WGOP’s facility was not insured and is a total loss.
Bad news.
There was a time when WWCS was licensed for more power, 7500 watts I think, and the owners reduced power so that a station near Washington DC, also on 540, could increase its power.
I’ve criticized Birach Broadcasting before, seeing WWCS, a once-great AM stereo station gone down hill after Birach took over, but I’m sorry for their loss. Even now WWCS has been operating with an awful reverberation in their sound that has not been corrected, and I wonder why no one at the station has noticed it.
On the good side, I’ve heard Birach-owned WPON 1460 out of Walled Lake Michigan, and thought their sound was excellent, dynamic and clean. That was off air through a web receiver.
Boomer