Although it had been broadcasting from two locations on Columbia Street for 18 years, it was not the top station in the market. Freda changed that.
Her huge winds knocked every radio station north of California off the air as she headed up the coast. Except for NW. Just a few weeks before, the station had bought a power unit from the air force that allowed its transmitter to keep on beaming its signal.
“Our radio station became the No. 1 station for emergencies and it never looked back,” says Bill Hughes, who was born and raised in New Westminster and was the station’s general manager and president.
New West resident and former NW newscaster John Ashbridge was working in Victoria at the time.
Photo Caption: Bill Hughes, former program director with CKNW radio, with the original ‘roving’ microphone he used to interview bus passengers disembarking at the Royal Towers Hotel, which used to also serve as a Greyhound terminal. The mic was presented to him in honour of his 15,000th broadcast.
CKDA in Victoria remained on the air throughout Typhone Freeda. The station lost its CP teleype feed as the line was down north of the City. The storm passed north of the Capital and did not affect CKDAs transmitter that was located on the lee side of Chatham Island. I was on the air from midnight to 6 a.m. and the only evidence of a storm from the basement of the Douglas Hotel were the telephone calls from people concerned about the big wind. GWP
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