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63-415: WSRA began as WLYB, first receiving its license on November 21, 1962. It changed callsigns to WQDE on July 17, 1972. In its earliest form AM 1250 was a country station. The following history [between brackets] was added by Dave Miller, who worked at the station in 1975 and 1976: Its call sign in the late 1960s and early 1970s was WLYB, which stood for Lynn-Yvette Broadcasting. It was run by Dave Flaegel,

126-540: A Marconi station ) was later added. By 1912, the need to quickly identify stations operated by multiple companies in multiple nations required an international standard ; an ITU prefix would be used to identify a country, and the rest of the call sign an individual station in that country. Merchant and naval vessels are assigned call signs by their national licensing authorities. In the case of states such as Liberia or Panama , which are flags of convenience for ship registration, call signs for larger vessels consist of

189-477: A call signal —or abbreviated as a call ) is a unique identifier for a transmitter station . A call sign can be formally assigned by a government agency, informally adopted by individuals or organizations, or even cryptographically encoded to disguise a station's identity. The use of call signs as unique identifiers dates to the landline railroad telegraph system. Because there was only one telegraph line linking all railroad stations , there needed to be

252-630: A general aviation flight would use the call sign November-niner-seven-eight-Charlie-Papa . However, in the United States a pilot of an aircraft would normally omit saying November , and instead use the name of the aircraft manufacturer or the specific model. At times, general aviation pilots might omit additional preceding numbers and use only the last three numbers and letters. This is especially true at uncontrolled fields (those without control towers) when reporting traffic pattern positions or at towered airports after establishing two-way communication with

315-535: A Great Britain call sign prefix, 90 and MGY to commemorate the 90th anniversary of historic 1912 radio distress calls from MGY , the Marconi station aboard the famed White Star luxury liner RMS Titanic ). The late King Hussein of Jordan was issued a special amateur license number, JY1 , which would have been the shortest possible call sign issued by the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. When identifying

378-459: A broadcaster of great girth, who custom made a rolling chair from the seat of a Pontiac Bonneville, and reinforced it with steel bracing. It was bought by Jim Wiggins, a Brunswick broadcaster, who also owned WYND, a country AM in Glynn County in the early 1970s. He changed the call sign to WQDE, "Cutie" for short, and played AC/Light Rock. In this time, the station made a meteoric rise and became

441-468: A call sign for broadcast stations; however, they are still required for broadcasters in many countries, including the United States. Mobile phone services do not use call signs on-air because the phones and their users are not licensed, instead the cell operator is the one holding the license. However, the U.S. still assigns a call sign to each mobile-phone spectrum license. In the United States, voluntary ships operating domestically are not required to have

504-425: A call sign or license to operate VHF radios , radar or an EPIRB . Voluntary ships (mostly pleasure and recreational) are not required to have a radio. However, ships which are required to have radio equipment (most large commercial vessels) are issued a call sign. A directory of radio station call signs is called a callbook. Callbooks were originally bound books that resembled a telephone directory and contained

567-686: A convention that aircraft radio stations (and, by extension, the aircraft itself) receive call signs consisting of five letters. For example, all British civil aircraft have a five-letter registration beginning with the letter G, which can also serve for a call sign. Canadian aircraft have a call sign beginning with C–F or C–G, such as C–FABC. wing-in-ground-effect vehicles and hovercraft in Canada are eligible to receive C–Hxxx call signs, and ultralight aircraft receive C-Ixxx call signs. In days gone by, even American aircraft used five-letter call signs, such as KH–ABC, but they were replaced prior to World War II by

630-406: A few times a day, but this practice is becoming very rare. Argentinian broadcast call signs consist of two or three letters followed by multiple numbers, the second and third letters indicating region. In Brazil, radio and TV stations are identified by a ZY, a third letter and three numbers. ZYA and ZYB are allocated to television stations; ZYI , ZYJ , ZYL , and ZYK designate AM stations; ZYG

693-453: A form of time-division multiplexing . Using the RTCM 12301.1 standard it is possible to send and receive text messages in a similar fashion to SMS between marine VHF transceivers which comply with this standard. However, as of 2019 very few transceivers support this feature. The recipient of the message needs to be tuned to the same channel as the transmitting station in order to receive it. In

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756-429: A full-duplex channel. To transmit the user presses a " push to talk " button on the set or microphone which turns the transmitter on and the receiver off in a device with half-duplex audio, even on a full-duplex radio channel; on devices with full-duplex audio the receiver is left on while transmitting on a full-duplex radio channel. Communication can take place in both directions simultaneously on full-duplex channels when

819-457: A geographical area, class of license, or identify a licensee as a visitor or temporary resident), and a 1-, 2-, or 3-letter suffix. In Australia, call signs are structured with a two letter prefix, a digit (which identifies geographical area), and a 2, 3 or 4 letter suffix. This suffix may be followed by a further suffix, or personal identifier, such as /P (portable), /M (mobile), /AM (aeronautical mobile) or /MM (maritime mobile). The number following

882-458: A larger and more effective antenna and a bigger display and buttons. A portable set (often essentially a waterproof, VHF walkie-talkie in design) can be carried on a kayak, or to a lifeboat in an emergency, has its own power source and is waterproof if GMDSS -approved. A few portable VHFs are even approved to be used as emergency radios in environments requiring intrinsically safe equipment (e.g. gas tankers, oil rigs, etc.). Voice only equipment

945-487: A major player in the market, becoming a strong challenger to the venerable WALG/1590AM. In late 1972, two heavy weight broadcasters left WALG to go to WQDE, including Ron Brown, a.k.a. 'Buzz One' on WALG, and Ron Maniscalco, who programmed WALG as Ron Mani. Ron Strother and Sonny Lofton also graced WQDE's air with great talent. Mani brought his "Original Saturday Morning Rock Revival" Oldies show, with great success. Albany native James E. Smith, a.k.a. Jack O'Brien, left

1008-427: A particular vessel require a Ship Radio License . Portable equipment that could be used in multiple craft, dinghys etc required a Ship Portable Radio Licence . For use on the inland waterways within continental Europe, a compulsory Automatic Transmitter Identification System (ATIS) transmission conveys the vessel's identity after each voice transmission. This is a ten-digit code that is either an encoded version of

1071-430: A range of about 100 kilometres (62 mi; 54 nmi). Marine VHF radio equipment is installed on all large ships and most seagoing small craft. It is also used, with slightly different regulation, on rivers and lakes. It is used for a wide variety of purposes, including marine navigation and traffic control, summoning rescue services and communicating with harbours , locks , bridges and marinas . Marine radio

1134-477: A similar brand, and the name of a broadcast station for legal purposes is normally its internationally recognised ITU call sign. Some common conventions are followed in each country. Broadcast stations in North America generally use call signs in the international series. In the United States of America, they are used for all FCC-licensed transmitters. The first letter generally is K for stations located west of

1197-521: A station by voice, the call sign may be given by simply stating the letters and numbers, or using a phonetic alphabet . Some countries mandate the use of the phonetic alphabet for identification. In wartime, monitoring an adversary's communications can be a valuable form of intelligence. Consistent call signs can aid in this monitoring, so in wartime, military units often employ tactical call signs and sometimes change them at regular intervals. In peacetime, some military stations will use fixed call signs in

1260-492: A string of 12 coastal stations stretched along the Atlantic seaboard from Bar Harbor, Maine to Cape May, New Jersey . The first marine radio transmitters used the longwave bands. During World War I amplitude modulation was developed, and in the 1920s spark radiotelegraphy equipment was replaced by vacuum tube radiotelephony allowing voice communication. Also in the 1920s, the ionospheric skip or skywave phenomenon

1323-410: A way to address each one when sending a telegram . In order to save time, two-letter identifiers were adopted for this purpose. This pattern continued in radiotelegraph operation; radio companies initially assigned two-letter identifiers to coastal stations and stations on board ships at sea. These were not globally unique, so a one-letter company identifier (for instance, 'M' and two letters as

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1386-767: Is not issued to such stations due to their unlicensed nature. Also, wireless network routers or mobile devices and computers using Wi-Fi are unlicensed and do not have call signs. On some personal radio services, such as CB, it is considered a matter of etiquette to create one's own call sign, which is called a handle (or trail name). Some wireless networking protocols also allow SSIDs or MAC addresses to be set as identifiers, but with no guarantee that this label will remain unique. Many mobile telephony systems identify base transceiver stations by implementing cell ID and mobile stations (e.g., phones) by requiring them to authenticate using international mobile subscriber identity (IMSI). International regulations no longer require

1449-423: Is still available in some areas, though its use has largely died out with the advent of mobile and satellite phones. Marine VHF radios can also receive weather radio broadcasts, where they are available. The accepted conventions for use of marine radio are collectively termed "proper operating procedure". These international conventions include: Slightly adjusted regulations can apply for inland shipping, such as

1512-620: Is the international calling and distress channel . Transmission power ranges between 1 and 25 watts, giving a maximum range of up to about 60 nautical miles (111 km) between aerials mounted on tall ships and hills, and 5 nautical miles (9 km; 6 mi) between aerials mounted on small boats at sea level. Frequency modulation (FM) is used, with vertical polarization, meaning that antennas have to be vertical in order to have good reception. For longer range communication at sea, marine MF and marine HF bands and satellite phones can be used. Half-duplex channels here are listed with

1575-403: Is the minimum requirement to use an installed marine VHF radio. This is usually obtained after completing a course of around two days and passing an exam. This is intended for those operating on lakes and in coastal areas whereas a Long Range Certificate is usually recommended for those operating further out as it also covers HF and MF radios as well as INMARSAT systems. Installations fixed on

1638-490: Is the traditional type, which relies totally on the human voice for calling and communicating. Many lower priced handheld units are voice only as well as older fixed units. DSC equipment, a part of the Global Maritime Distress Safety System (GMDSS), provides all the functionality of voice-only equipment and, additionally, allows several other features: When a DSC radio is bought new the user will get

1701-666: Is used for shortwave stations; ZYC , ZYD , ZYM , and ZYU are given to FM stations. In Australia, broadcast call signs are optional, but are allocated by the Australian Communications and Media Authority and are unique for each broadcast station. Most European and Asian countries do not use call signs to identify broadcast stations, but Japan, South Korea, Indonesia, the Philippines and Taiwan do have call sign systems. Spanish broadcasters used call signs consisting of E followed by two letters and up to three digits until

1764-539: The Dominion of Newfoundland government retain their original VO calls. In Mexico, AM radio stations use XE call signs (such as XEW-AM ), while the majority of FM radio and television stations use XH . Broadcast call signs are normally four or five alpha characters in length, plus the -FM , -TV , or -TDT suffix where applicable. In South America call signs have been a traditional way of identifying radio and TV stations. Some stations still broadcast their call signs

1827-1593: The Mississippi River and W for eastern stations. Historic exceptions in the east include KYW in Philadelphia and KDKA in Pittsburgh, while western exceptions include WJAG in Norfolk, Nebraska , and WOAI in San Antonio. All new call signs have been four-character for some decades, though there are historical three-character call letters still in use today, such as KSL in Salt Lake City; KOA in Denver; WHO in Des Moines; WWJ and WJR in Detroit; WJW-TV in Cleveland ; WBT in Charlotte; WBZ in Boston; WSM in Nashville; WGR in Buffalo; KFI ; KNX and KHJ in Los Angeles; and WGN , WLS and WLS-TV in Chicago. American radio stations announce their call signs (except for rare cases in which would interfere with

1890-580: The very high frequency (VHF) radio band in the frequency range between 156 and 174  MHz , designated by the International Telecommunication Union as the VHF maritime mobile band . In some countries additional channels are used, such as the L and F channels for leisure and fishing vessels in the Nordic countries (at 155.5–155.825 MHz). Transmitter power is limited to 25 watts, giving them

1953-448: The "Voice Of Praise". Owned by Jimmy Keyton of Life Line Ministries, the program director was Wyne Peron. On July 1, 2002, the station changed its call sign to the current WSRA. This article about a radio station in the state of Georgia is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Call sign In broadcasting and radio communications , a call sign (also known as a call name or call letters —and historically as

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2016-511: The 1960s when flight radio officers (FRO) were no longer required on international flights. The Russian Federation kept FROs for the Moscow-Havana run until around 2000. Currently, all signs in aviation are derived from several different policies, depending upon the type of flight operation and whether or not the caller is in an aircraft or at a ground facility. In most countries, unscheduled general aviation flights identify themselves using

2079-525: The A and B frequencies the same. The frequencies, channels, and some of their purposes are governed by the ITU . For an authoritative list see. The original allocation of channels consisted of only channels 1 to 28 with 50 kHz spacing between channels, and the second frequency for full-duplex operation 4.6 MHz higher. Improvements in radio technology later meant that the channel spacing could be reduced to 25 kHz with channels 60 to 88 interspersed between

2142-586: The Internet to instantly obtain the address of another amateur radio operator and their QSL Managers. The most well known and used on-line QSL databases include QRZ.COM, IK3QAR, HamCall, F6CYV, DXInfo, OZ7C and QSLInfo. Marine radio Marine VHF radio is a worldwide system of two way radio transceivers on ships and watercraft used for bidirectional voice communication from ship-to-ship, ship-to-shore (for example with harbormasters ), and in certain circumstances ship-to-aircraft. It uses FM channels in

2205-483: The Nordic countries Fishing (Ship-to-ship) Used in the Nordic countries Fishing, also recreational fishing (Ship-to-ship) Used in the Nordic countries Marine VHF mostly uses half-duplex audio equipment and non-relayed transmissions. Ship to ship communication is over a single radio frequency ( simplex ), while ship to shore often uses full duplex frequency pairs, however the transceivers are usually half-duplex devices that cannot receive when transmitting even on

2268-591: The US and Canada. Canadian Coast Guard - Search & Rescue BC Coast  A   A  port operations, border guard authorities, Also some yacht clubs and marinas Backup Small Ship Safety port operations Leisure activities (Ship-to-ship) Used in the Nordic countries and Estonia Leisure activities (Ship-to-ship) Used in the Nordic countries and Estonia Leisure activities (Ship-to-ship) Used in Finland and Norway Fishing (Ship-to-ship) Used in

2331-494: The United States, any person can legally purchase a Marine VHF radio and use it to communicate without requiring any special license as long as they abide by certain rules, but in a great many other countries a license is required to transmit on Marine VHF frequencies. In the United Kingdom and Ireland and some other European countries both the operator and the equipment must be separately licensed. A Short Range Certificate

2394-740: The amateur radio service as a citizen of their country has been assigned there. The first amateur radio call sign assigned to the International Space Station was NA1SS by the United States. OR4ISS (Belgium), DP0ISS (Germany), and RS0ISS (Russia) are examples of others, but are not all-inclusive of others also issued. Broadcasters are allocated call signs in many countries. While broadcast radio stations will often brand themselves with plain-text names, identities such as " Cool FM ", " Rock 105" or "the ABC network" are not globally unique. Another station in another city or country may (and often will) have

2457-539: The broadcast of very long works of classical or opera music) at or near the top of each hour, as well as sign-on and sign-off for stations that do not broadcast 24 hours. Beginning in the early 2000s, digital subchannels were assigned a -DT# suffix, where # is the subchannel (starting with the number 2). In Canada, the publicly owned Canadian Broadcasting Corporation uses the prefix CB ; privately owned commercial broadcast stations use primarily CF and CH through CK prefixes; and four stations licensed to St. John's by

2520-535: The call sign corresponding to the aircraft's registration number (also called N-number in the U.S., or tail number ). In this case, the call sign is spoken using the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) phonetic alphabet . Aircraft registration numbers internationally follow the pattern of a country prefix, followed by a unique identifier made up of letters and numbers. For example, an aircraft registered as N978CP conducting

2583-517: The country/territory identifier is, instead, appended to the call sign; e.g., W1AW/VE4, or VE3XYZ/W1. Special call signs are issued in the amateur radio service either for special purposes, VIPs, or for temporary use to commemorate special events. Examples include VO1S ( VO1 as a Dominion of Newfoundland call sign prefix, S to commemorate Marconi 's first trans-Atlantic message, a single-character Morse code S sent from Cornwall , England to Signal Hill, St. John's in 1901) and GB90MGY ( GB as

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2646-511: The current American system of civilian aircraft call signs (see below). One exception to the parallelism between registration and call sign is ultralight airplanes in France, who are not obliged to carry a radio and indeed often don't. Radio call signs used for communication in crewed spaceflight are not formalized or regulated to the same degree as for aircraft. The three nations currently launching crewed space missions use different methods to identify

2709-738: The designated call sign, so F13C would be the Charlie fire team . Unused suffixes can be used for other call signs that do not fall into the standard call sign matrix, for example the unused 33A call sign is used to refer to the company sergeant major . No call signs are issued to transmitters of the long-range navigation systems ( Decca , Alpha , Omega ), or transmitters on frequencies below 10 kHz , because frequencies below 10 kHz are not subject to international regulations. In addition, in some countries lawful unlicensed low-power personal and broadcast radio signals ( Citizen's Band (CB), Part 15 or ISM bands ) are permitted; an international call sign

2772-426: The equipment on both ends allows it. Full duplex channels can be used to place calls over the public telephone network for a fee via a marine operator. When equipment supporting full-duplex audio is used, the call is similar to one using a mobile phone or landline. When half-duplex is used, voice is only carried one way at a time and the party on the boat must press the transmit button only when speaking. This facility

2835-409: The first Morse code distress call, the letters CQD , used until 1906 when SOS was agreed on. The first significant marine rescue due to radio was the 1909 sinking of the luxury liner RMS Republic , in which 1,500 lives were saved. This and the 1912 RMS Titanic rescue brought the field of marine radio to public consciousness, and marine radio operators were regarded as heroes. By 1920, the US had

2898-563: The first two digits indicate the nominal length of the boat in feet. For example, Coast Guard 47021 refers to the 21st in the series of 47-foot motor lifeboats. The call sign might be abbreviated to the final two or three numbers during operations, for example: Coast Guard zero two one . Originally aviation mobile stations (aircraft) equipped with radiotelegraphy were assigned five-letter call signs (e.g. KHAAQ). Land stations in aviation were assigned four-letter call signs (e.g. WEAL – Eastern Air Lines, NYC.) These call signs were phased out in

2961-434: The ground and space radio stations; the United States uses either the names given to the space vehicles, or else the project name and mission number. Russia traditionally assigns code names as call signs to individual cosmonauts , more in the manner of aviator call signs , rather than to the spacecraft. The only continuity in call signs for spacecraft have been the issuance of "ISS"-suffixed call signs by various countries in

3024-499: The international series. The United States Army uses fixed station call signs which begin with W , such as WAR, used by U.S. Army Headquarters. Fixed call signs for the United States Air Force stations begin with A , such as AIR, used by USAF Headquarters. The United States Navy , United States Marine Corps , and United States Coast Guard use a mixture of tactical call signs and international call signs beginning with

3087-458: The jurisdiction of a foreign government, an identifying station pre-pends the call sign with the country prefix and number of the country/territory from which the operation is occurring. For example, W4/G3ABC would denote a licensed amateur from the United Kingdom who is operating in the fourth district of the United States. There are exceptions; in the case of U.S./Canadian reciprocal operations,

3150-478: The late 1970s. Portugal had a similar system, their callsigns beginning with C ; these also ceased to be used in the 1970s. Britain has no call signs in the American sense, but allows broadcast stations to choose their own trade mark call sign up to six words in length. Amateur radio call signs are in the international series and normally consist of a one or two character prefix, a digit (which may be used to denote

3213-459: The letter N . In the British military , tactical voice communications use a system of call signs of the form letter-digit-digit . Within a standard infantry battalion, these characters represent companies, platoons and sections respectively, so that 3 Section, 1 Platoon of F Company might be F13. In addition, a suffix following the initial call sign can denote a specific individual or grouping within

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3276-542: The major market race after great stints at KOMA, Oklahoma City; WFUN, Miami; and WRKO, Boston; to come home, and brought his golden tone to Cutie in 1976. Jack then went to competitor WALG, as program director. The station was on the air in the 1970s as WQDE, owned by Dave and Virgie McGriff. In 1978, it was called 1250Q The Radio Station. Programmed by Tom Clay, with a morning show entitled "3 Speed and Sneakers" (Tom Clay and Beau Stone) playing AC music. WQDE became WANL on August 31, 1987, playing inspirational music and called

3339-430: The name and addressees of licensed radio stations in a given jurisdiction (country). Modern Electrics published the first callbook in the United States in 1909. Today, the primary purpose of a callbook is to allow amateur radio operators to send a confirmation post card, called a QSL card to an operator with whom they have communicated via radio. Callbooks have evolved to include on-line databases that are accessible via

3402-436: The name of the vessel is used instead. Ships in the US still wishing to have a radio license are under FCC class SA: "Ship recreational or voluntarily equipped." Those calls follow the land mobile format of the initial letter K or W followed by one or two letters followed by three or four numbers (such as KX0983 or WXX0029). U.S. Coast Guard small boats have a number that is shown on both bows (i.e. port and starboard) in which

3465-927: The national prefix plus three letters (for example, 3LXY, and sometimes followed by a number, e.g. 3LXY2). United States merchant vessels are given call signs beginning with the letters "W" or "K" while US naval ships are assigned call signs beginning with "N". Originally, both ships and broadcast stations were assigned call signs in this series consisting of three or four letters. Ships equipped with Morse code radiotelegraphy, or life boat radio sets, aviation ground stations, broadcast stations were given four-letter call signs. Maritime coast stations on high frequency (both radiotelegraphy and radiotelephony) were assigned three-letter call signs. As demand for both marine radio and broadcast call signs grew, gradually American-flagged vessels with radiotelephony only were given longer call signs with mixed letters and numbers. Leisure craft with VHF radios may not be assigned call signs, in which case

3528-591: The opportunity to program it with the MMSI number of the ship it is intended to be used on. However to change the MMSI after the initial programming can be problematic and require special proprietary tools. This is allegedly done to prevent theft. More advanced transceiver units support AIS. This relies on a GPS receiver built into the VHF equipment or an externally connected one by which the transceiver obtains its position and transmits this information along with some other details about

3591-513: The original channels. Channels 75 and 76 are omitted as they are either side of the calling and distress channel 16, acting as guard channels. The frequencies which would have been the second frequencies on half-duplex channels are not used for marine purposes and can be used for other purposes that vary by country. For example, 161.000 to 161.450 MHz are part of the allocation to the Association of American Railroads channels used by railways in

3654-400: The prefix is normally a single number (0 to 9). Some prefixes, such as Djibouti's (J2), consist of a letter followed by a number. Hence, in the hypothetical Djibouti call sign, J29DBA, the prefix is J2 , the number is 9 , and the suffix is DBA . Others may start with a number followed by a letter, for example, Jamaican call signs begin with 6Y. When operating with reciprocal agreements under

3717-430: The ship (MMSI, cargo, draught, destination and some others) to nearby ships. AIS operates as a mesh network and full featured units relay AIS messages from other ships, greatly extending the range of this system; however some low-end units are receive only or do not support the relaying functionality. AIS data is carried on dedicated VHF channels 87B and 88B at a baud rate of 9,600bit/s using GMSK modulation and uses

3780-510: The ship's alphanumeric call sign, or for vessels from outside the region, the ship MMSI prefixed with "9". The requirement to use ATIS in Europe, and which VHF channels may be used, are strongly regulated, most recently by the Basel agreements. A marine VHF set is a combined transmitter and receiver and only operates on standard, international frequencies known as channels . Channel 16 (156.8 MHz)

3843-507: The tower controller. For example, Skyhawk eight-Charlie-Papa, left base . In commercial aviation, the callsign is usually the ICAO Flight number . For example, Delta Airlines Flight 744 would have the flight number DL744 and the callsign would be Delta 744 . In most countries, the aircraft call sign or "tail number"/"tail letters" (also known as registration marks) are linked to the international radio call sign allocation table and follow

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3906-501: Was discovered, which allowed lower power vacuum tube transmitters operating in the shortwave bands to communicate at long distances. Hoping to foil German detection during the World War II Battle of the Atlantic, American and British convoy escorts used Talk-Between-Ships (TBS) radios operating on VHF. Sets can be fixed or portable. A fixed set generally has the advantages of a more reliable power source, higher transmit power,

3969-464: Was the first commercial application of radio technology, allowing ships to keep in touch with shore and other ships, and send out a distress call for rescue in case of emergency. Guglielmo Marconi invented radio communication in the 1890s, and the Marconi Company installed wireless telegraphy stations on ships beginning around 1900. Marconi built a string of shore stations and in 1904 established

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