Evening star., 1950-05-14
| Ether Police
On the Job
By Clarke Beech

by Clarke oeoeh
You can get into a peck OF
trouble by stealing a thin strip
of air.
You may still safely breathe
all you want but if you try to
send radio broadcasts on air
space that doesn't belong to you,
the ether police will get you.
Uncle Sam has l9 enormous
ears at radio towers all over the
country. They listen day and
night, and they can hear you
thousands of miles away. Often
they catch treSpassers within a
few minutes after they sneak
radio bands where they don't
belong. The fine can be as high
as $4,000, and the prison term
can be as long as two years.
The police work in the moni-
toring and investigating services
of the Federal Communications
Commission. Their job is to
help enforce the Federal Com
munications Act, which requires
that all radio stations and oper-
ations be licensed and that once
a station has been assigned a
frequency it must stay within its
own band.
Odd Causes Found
The interference often causes
trouble to only one station. per-
haps thousands Of miles, away
FEC monitors have detected
interference in this country
from wobbly radio broadcasters
as far away as South Africa
and Java.
One day in 1947 the Tropical
Radio Telegraph, operating from
Miami to Central America. re-
ported interference on its band
Within "a hours FCC's monitors
and engineers had spotted the
trouble in an electronic heater
in a manufacturing plant near
Detroit.
Later the same year a major
alarm was sounded from La
Guardia Airport in New York
when interference suddenly
began to disrupt communica-
tions with transatlantic planes.
1t took several days of search
ing, but this time the trouble
was found in a heater in a fac
tory at JohnstoWn. Pa.
First step in this type Of
sleuthing is for the FEC to alert
three or more of its 19 monitor
ing stations. They all tune in
on the frequency where there is
trouble. BY use of direction
finders they can draw lines on
maps in the direction from
which the offending signal is
coming.
Then the general area in
which the lines converge is
plotted by a central intelligence
unit. To this area the FEC dis
patches monitoring cars. Two
or more of these drive around
and take new fixes" on the
signal until they pinpoint it
to city block. a certain factor,
a hotel-or racetrack Grand
stand.
If the offending apparatus still
can't be quickly spotted, in
vestigatorS go on foot with
"snifters"-receiving sets which
they can carry in their pockets
With these they trace the signal
to the room or spot where it is
loudest.
Prison Network
It's detective work in uncov-
ering unlicensed radio stations
turns up some odd situations,
Last year it found a network"
of three such stations in Mis-
sissippi. One of the stations
was inside the State prison
farm at Parchman. A trusty
serving a 50-year sentence had
learned radio work as a part
of his rehabilitation program
Another operator was a rela-
tive outside the prison, and the
third man was a friend. They
just chatted on the air about
legal steps by which the pris-
oner hoped to gain his release.
A perennial violation, which
usually brings jail sentences and
heavy fines. involves racetrack
characters who beat the book
makers by broadcasting racing
results from the grandstands
They carry pocket transmit
ters, and their entire bodies
often are strung with antenna
wires. They broadcast to
stronger stations. hidden in
trucks or tourist cabins just out
side the tracks, and these relay
the results to friends or Gus
toners near bookie shops.
When the bookie accepts the
bet, he doesn't know the race
already has been run. The Gov
eminent first learned of this
kind of cheating in 1928. and