Transmitters vs. Tornadoes: The Battle for Broadcast

You don't get into broadcast engineering thinking you'll become a first responder, but that's exactly what happened on May 26, 2025, when an EF3 tornado tore through St. Louis. The powerful storm passed just 250 yards from the KMOX FM transmitter tower, knocking the heritage 50,000-watt station off the air and triggering an emergency response that reveals the true backbone of radio resilience.

This episode takes you behind the scenes as KMOX engineer Kyle Hammer – who had just turned 40 that day – navigates storm-damaged roads in the middle of the night to reach the transmitter site. What follows is a masterclass in engineering under pressure: assessing damage, implementing field improvisations, and restoring a vital communication channel when listeners needed it most. Within an hour of going dark, KMOX returned to the airwaves thanks not to automation or AI, but to human judgment, technical expertise, and sheer determination.

The story raises important questions about broadcast infrastructure in an era of increasingly extreme weather. While emergency alert systems, backup power, and redundant transmission paths are critical, they're only as effective as the people who understand and maintain them. As cellular networks fail and internet connections drop during disasters, radio's comparative simplicity becomes its greatest strength – but only when supported by skilled professionals willing to drive through debris-filled streets at midnight. This is what resilience looks like, and it's a powerful reminder that local radio still matters not just as entertainment, but as a lifeline when everything else fails.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
You don't get into broadcast engineering thinking
you'll become a first responder,but sometimes that's exactly
what you become.
On May 26, 2025, an EF3 tornadotore across St Louis.
Homes were destroyed, liveswere upended and in the middle
of it, a station lost its signal.
But not just any station KMOX,a Heritage 50,000-watt AM

(00:25):
powerhouse with decades ofservice behind it.
When the storm hit, kmox FMwent off the air.
What happened next is a casestudy in engineering under
pressure.
It's all about vigilance,improvisation and the real-world
backbone that holds radiotogether when things fall apart.
I'm Tyler Woodward, a seasonedsenior broadcast engineer for a

(00:47):
network of public media stations.
I've been doing this since 2014.
I'm certified as a CBNT throughthe Society of Broadcast
Engineers.
This show is fully modulated.
Where signal meets podcast.
This show is designed to helpthose curious understand how the
broadcast industry works fromthe technical engineering side.

(01:40):
It started, the way many storiesdo in this line of work, with a
quiet warning.
Meteorologists were tracking astorm across the Midwest.
The National Weather Serviceissued alerts as a powerful
system spun toward Missouri andthe KMOX engineering office,
kyle Hammer and Aaron Cox, werekeeping watch.
Then the blip KMOX's FMtransmitter site, switched over

(02:05):
to generator power.
That in itself isn'tnecessarily alarming Sites go to
backup all the time but it wasa sign Something upstream wasn't
right, and that something, itturns out, was a tornado.
At 11.37 pm on May 26, 2025, anEF3 tornado passed just 250

(02:45):
yards from the KMOX FM tower inSt Louis.
That's less than the length ofa city block.
The site lost power shortlyafter the station dropped off
the air.
If you were listening thatnight, the moment probably came
without warning, mid-sentence ormid-song replaced by silence or

(03:09):
static.
These kinds of events are thenightmare scenario for any
broadcast engineer, but they'realso exactly what we prepare for
.
Hammer, who had just turned 40that day, decided to act.
He left for the site in themiddle of the night, navigating
storm-damaged roads litteredwith debris and downed trees.

(03:29):
That decision to move fast toget hands on the site is what
made the difference.
When Hammer reached thetransmitter site, he found

(04:09):
exactly what you'd expect aftera near-miss with a tornado Trees
were snapped, roads wereblocked, power lines were down,
but the structure itself heldtogether.
A stroke of luck and a nightthat could have been far, far
worse.
Still, the station was off theair.
He did what any seasonedengineer does in a crisis Assess

(04:34):
.
The generator had kicked in, butthe backup systems alone
weren't restoring the full chain.
Kmox needed a workaround.
What followed was a fieldimprovisation Hammer rerouted
power distribution and realignedequipment to get the signal
flowing again.
It wasn't pretty, it wasn'tautomatic.

(04:55):
It was a physical labor,technical know-how and muscle
memory the kind you build overthe years of responding to sight
issues, truck rolls and latenight alarms.
Within about an hour of goingdark, kmox FM was back on the
air.
Odyssey's EVP of programming,jeff Sotolano, praised the

(05:16):
effort, calling it a textbookexample of what local radio and
engineering teams do inemergencies.
That might sound like somecorporate applause, but it's a
rare public recognition ofsomething we in the field
already know Broadcasting isonly resilient because of the
people behind it, and thosepeople are often operating in

(05:39):
conditions no studio or specsheet could anticipate
Rainsoak's sleep, deprived andworking under pressure.
If you're enjoying FullyModulated, tap the follow button

(06:03):
, leave a rating or share thisepisode with someone who's
curious about how radio reallyworks, especially in a crisis.
Ratings and shares help otherpeople discover this show,
especially in a crisis.
Ratings and shares help otherpeople discover this show.
This story is about more thanone tornado or one tower.
It's about the role local radiostill plays in public safety

(06:23):
and how that role depends notjust on the technology but on
human judgment.
The technology but on humanjudgment, the emergency alert
system, backup power,transmitter switching these are
all critical tools, but someonestill had to respond.
Someone has to read the logs,notice the patterns, make the
drive.
The human element is what keptKMOX FM from staying dark that

(06:48):
night.
Broadcast engineers are ofteninvisible until they're
essential, and moments like thisprove how central they are to
keeping the public informed, notthrough automation or
artificial intelligence, butthrough grit and the experience.
There's also a broader lessonhere about infrastructure.

(07:09):
Tornadoes, floods, wildfiresthey're not rare events anymore
and broadcast needs moreinvestment and site hardening,
redundancy and response planningif we're going to keep showing
up For communities when theyneed us the most.
Now, this isn't about nostalgiaFor old radio.

(07:30):
It's about acknowledgement.
It's about acknowledging thatwhen cellular networks go down
or data centers fail, radio canstill punch through if we
maintain it, fund it and staffit with people who know how it
all works.
As Kyle Hammer later told RadioWorld, the engineering team at

(07:53):
KMOX is proud of their response,but they're already reviewing
the event to improve responsetime, next time.
That's what good engineers do.
We treat every fix as a lesson,something to improve upon.
So what happened at KMOX?

(08:21):
A tornado came through within afew hundred feet of their
broadcast tower.
The power went out, the stationwent off the air and then,
because an engineer paidattention and took action, the
signal came back.
This is what resilience lookslike, and it's a reminder that
local radio still matters, notjust as a source of music or

(08:43):
talk, but as a lifeline.
Got questions, feedback or astory to share from your own
time out in the field?
Text me.
Link is in the episodedescription.
I'd love to include listenerstories in future episodes.
If you like what you heardtoday, help keep the signal

(09:14):
strong.
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It helps others find FullyModulated.
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