THE RADIO ATLANTIS STORY PART 1

When their three-month contract ended with the Caroline Organisation in mid-October the owner of Radio Atlantis, Belgian textile millionaire Adriaan van Landschoot, started looking around for a radio-ship of his own. An obvious choice was the Radio Condor boat that had been anchored off the coast of Holland since July, and which was rumoured to be owned by.the evangelists Johann Maasbach and Dominee Toornvliet. Before the end of the month Mr. van Landschoot had successfully acquired the vessel. The first test transmissions were carried out on November 3rd from a small 500 Watt . transmitter on 227 metres, and were composed entirely of music. She was next in the headlines on November 6th when Robin Banks, who was reading the 20.00 GMT RNI News, reported that the Radio Condor ship had broken her anchor for the second time this year and was drifting towards Zandvoort. Luckily disaster was averted when the Wijsmuller tug "Titaan", that had come to her assistance, succeeded in getting a line aboard. It was decided to tow the radio-ship to Cuxhaven in West Germany where a new heavy duty anchor could be fitted. She remained in the West German harbour for some six weeks, and it was whilst there that her name was changed to "Jeanine". Upon her departure on December 22nd she was towed to a new anchorage off the Belgian coast, 12½ miles from Knokke.

M.V. Janiene (Photo:- Steve England)

The first test conducted on 270 metres (1115 kHz) took place the next day, December 23rd, this was on very low power, in fact, a mere 100 Watts. Further testing took place on the morning of the 24th with the 500 W. transmitter; and again that night between 21.30-23.00 GMT radiating a carrier only, but using the bigger transmitter that was on the boat that had previously been used on REM Island, its power output on this occasion was 1 kW, at 23.00 GMT music was transmitted. Christmas Day 1973 will be long remembered by free radio fans living in the South East of England, for not only were they able to hear Caroline, but if they had taken the trouble to tune down the medium-wave band to 270 metres they would have heard Radio Atlantis broadcasting in English! The station came on the.,air at 11.58 GMT with a special Christmas show presented by Crispian St. John, the then Programme Director, this was Cris at his very best injecting an enthusiasm into his show which few DJ's these days seem able to do. The programme could be heard until 15.25 GMT when it was lost under interference from the Italian station that used the same channel. During the middle part of the day, however, the station was coming in loud and clear despite its relatively low power of 1 kW. It could be heard once again rather weakly from 23.15 GMT onwards, C.S.J. was still DJing and he continued behind the microphone till 01.00 GMT on Boxing Day.

For the remainder of December 26th the programme run-down. was as follows:01.00-03.00 Andy Anderson (the transmitter engineer who hails from Tonbridge Wells), 03.00-05.00 Johnny Dwyer (the ship's cook, he comes from the Liverpool area), 05.00-07.00 Non-stop Music, 07.00-08.00 ?, 08.00-09.00 Non-stop Music, 09.00-12.00 C.S.J., 12.00-14.00 Non-stop Music, 14.00-15.00 C.S.J.., 15.00 {more non-stop music, but as-on: the previous day the signal soon-deteriorated); 19.00-23.00 Andy Anderson, 23-00 until 05.00 GMT the next day was Q.S.J, again.. A similar pattern of English programmes continued up to and including December-29th. Most of these broadcasts were test trans- missions in preparation for Radio.Atlantis forthcoming Flemish-language service.

The Official Opening Day of the station, and the start of the Flemish Service was on Sunday the 30th December, 1973. The first day's programmes were as follows: (FLEMISH SERVICE); 05.00-07.00 Non-stop Music, 07.00-08.00 Dave Jones, 08.00-10.00 ?, 10.00-11.00 "Vlaamse Top 15" Alfred van den Bos, 12.00-15.00 "Radio Atlantis Top 40" Moses van de Berg , 15.00-17.00 Alfred van den:Bos, 17,00-18.00 Theo van der Velden.( INTERNATIONAL SERVICE) 18.00-20.00 C.S.J., 20.00-22.00 Johnny Dwyer, 22.00-24-00 Andy Anderson 24.00-05.00_GMT C.S.J. That night Cris related a sad little incident , that had taken place earlier in the day - a short break had occurred in transmission, between 13.00-13.05 GMT, and Cris explained that this was due to a bird being sucked into the air-intake of the generator, and that they had switched it off for a few minutes in order to free it, but unfortunately the bird was already dead. At 13.00 GMT on January 1st Cris had to cut into a Flemish programme, which incidentally are all on tape and request that the office urgently, send out a transmitter valve No. 6146 and a very hot Calor Gas soldering iron. Technical troubles put the station off the air for the next few days but they were back on the air by the evening of the 5th, 2.5 kW was being squeezed out of the ex-REM Island, transmitter during the test transmission on January 6th. The familiar voice of Gerard van der Zee was heard doing a programme between 12.00-13.00 GMT on January 8th. Another newcomer to the station at this time was a DJ called Frans (later known as Frans van Brugge), his first show was presented on January 9th, and was broadcast between 05.00-06.00 GMT. Next came Steve England, he did his first programme on January 27th having arrived on the boat a week earlier. There were two departures from the Flemish Service at about the end of January, these were Dave Jones and Gerard.van der Zee. Luk van Kapellen was logged doing a show on.February 5th, and Debbie England joined her husband aboard the radio-ship on the 13th and she did a show of her own from 22.00-24.00 GMT the same day. One Sunday at the beginning of February (date unknown) Radio Atlantis carried out an unpublicized test, transmission on 201 metres. Steve announced that the new English schedule would be from 22.00-06.00 GMT nightly, and this came into effect from February 13th. Two of the "Jeanine"s engineers made their DJ debut on the 15th when they jointly compared the "Starshine" programme, their names were Derek Jones and James Rafferty. On February 18th the last C.S.J. show was heard, it was a tape recording and was broadcast between 00.00-01.00 GMT. By now programme names had been introduced for the various time slots on the International Service, 22.00-24.00 GMT was "Starshine", 24.00-03.00 GMT is called "Midnight Special" & 03.00-06.00 GMT became "Yawn into Dawn". Towards the end of the month Steve England was appointed Programme Director in place of C.S.J. who had had to relinquish the position. Steve will undoubtedly maintain and improve on the high standards set by his predecessor, and the Editorial staff of "Monitor" would like to offer Steve our heartiest congratulations upon his new post. The station was off the air on the morning of February 28th, this was because a new modulation choke was being fitted to the transmitter, and when it was switched on again at 12.57 GMT for the resumption of programming, it had, to everyones amazement, quadrupled the signal strength, although the actual power output was, and still is, only 1½ kW! That evening test broadcasts in English filled in the 18.00-22.00 GMT gap..

The Janiene’s Funnel with 270 frequency (Photo:- Steve England)

At 14.48 GMT on the afternoon of Sunday March 3rd it was suddenly announced in English that the station would be leaving 270 metres at 15.00 GMT and would resume broadcasting at 16.00 GMT on a new wavelength of 227 metres (1331 kHz). It was nearer 16,30 GMT before Atlantis reappeared on 227 metres (To be strictly accurate the new wavelength is 225•4 metres). From 16.30-17.00 GMT there were many breaks in transmission, but the fault was soon put right and between 17.06-21.00 GMT we had the pleasure of listening to new English DJ who had only arrived on the ship that morning, this was Dave Owen, a recruit from Radio Jackie. The wavelength change has resulted in the International Service being extended from eight hours a day to twelve and it is now heard from 19.00-07.00 BST/CET. The station's mailing address is as follows :- Radio Atlantis, International Service, P.O. Box 385, Oostburg Holland.

As these words are written news reaches us that Dave Rogers (of RNI fames will shortly be becoming a member of the Atlantis DJ team.

We earnestly suggest that, if you have not already done so, you tune into 227. metres and take a listen to "Radio Atlantis...The First Name in European Radio", you'll not be disappointed!

The Editor acknowledges with gratitude the assistance of the following who have helped with the production of this issue:- Andy Archer, Roy Brooker, Emiel Clarijs, Steve England, Colin Howard, Dave Jay, Frans Reynders, Paul Southgate, and John Troukens.

(First printed in MONITOR issue number 5)