WKHQ tower down near East Jordan, MI

Severe weather this past Sunday (3/30) across Michigan took dozens of broadcasters throughout the state, bringing down power lines and affecting broadcasters without backup power.  Ice build up has brought down three broadcast towers in the northern part of the lower peninsula.

The tower of MacDonald Garber Broadcasting's WKHQ-FM (Charlevoix-Petoskey-Traverse City) was toppled during ice storms, knocking the station off the air on Sunday Night.  “The KHQ tower — all 600 feet of it — blew down in the Petoskey ice storm last night,” the station posted on Instagram Monday morning. “We are working to figure out how we can get back on the air as soon as possible.”

On Monday Morning, "106 KHQ” morning host Ashley Z joined “Mike in the Morning” on co-owned adult hits “Bob FM 104.5” WZTC to explain the situation. “Last night… our tower, all 600 feet of our tower, literally fell,” she explained, “it hit the engineering building on the way down.” The tower, she said, “is on the ground right now, and it’s lost due to ice… our tower is dead, so KHQ doesn’t exist at the moment.”

WFUP tower northwest of Vanderbilt

As of Monday afternoon, MacDonald Garber Broadcasting’s Peter Garber told Inside Radio that the station remains off the air and is unable to stream due to no power in the area. Furthermore, the tower site “is completely inaccessible due to downed trees and power lines,” Garber said. “But we do have a plan to get KHQ up and running via a backup as soon as we are able to do the work.”

Aside from the WKHQ signal, the tower also supported the antenna of FM translator W272CR, which rebroadcasts the company's WMKT-AM, Charlevoix.

Heritage Broadcasting’s WFUP-TV (Vanderbilt) saw the top section of its 630-foot tower snap off following Sunday's ice storms, taking the station off-air as well as Black Diamond Broadcasting's WGFM-FM (Cheboygan) and Smile FM's WTLI-FM (Bear Creek Township), both tenants on the WFUP tower.

“We will be assessing once (the) road is back open and we gain access to the site,” 9&10 News Director of Operations Pete Ludviksen said. “If possible, we will go up on the auxiliary tower.”

On Friday Morning (4/4), the MAB learned of a third broadcast tower down.  The Wednesday (4/2) ice storm brought down the tower of Bryan Hollenbaugh's WMJZ-FM (Gaylord).  Hollenbaught, writing on Facebook is hopeful of returning to the air this weekend, "...we'll put together a temporary antenna next to the studios in Gaylord, where we've been operating on generator, and should be back on the air (hopefully) by this weekend."

WMJZ (Gaylord) tower down