Florida Panhandle Wildfires - WJHG & WMBB transmitters at risk?

[tyrannical bastard 3955]

There are currently two major wildfires in the Bay County area. 

 

One is just east of Panama City in the Springfield/Hiland Park area.  This is the Adkins Avenue fire that is currently 1400 acres and 35 percent contained.  8 houses have been destroyed and others have been damaged.

https://www.mypanhandle.com/news/local-news/bay-county/panama-city/several-homes-destroyed-by-adkins-avenue-fire/

There is currently a mandatory evacuation area between Transmitter Road (not related to the stations), Star Avenue, US 98 and US 231.

 

The other is a massive wildfire situated in a largely non-populated area straddling between Bay, Calhoun and Gulf counties. This is the Bertha Swamp fire that is currently 8000 acres and is only 15 percent contained.  

There is a mandatory evacuation area in the Youngstown area related to this fire that potentially contains the site where the WJHG (and WECP) and WMBB transmitters are located.  This includes the area north of Scotts Ferry Road, which the transmitter is located off of on the north side.

 

Before 2013, this was solely the WMBB transmitter site.  After Hoak was sold to Gray (and WMBB was spun off to Nexstar because of Gray's longstanding ownership of WJHG), WJHG moved their main transmitter to WMBB's tower and made their old tower off FL 20 an auxiliary.  The combined site off of Scotts Ferry Road is owned by a third party but Gray owns the old site.

 

Should this area become endangered, WMBB doesn't have a backup transmitter, but WJHG still has their auxiliary site and broadcasts WECP as a subchannel.  Hopefully the weather will improve over the next several days offering better conditions to contain these fires.   Much of this is a result of Hurricane Michael decimating the vast timberlands in these areas, creating ideal conditions for fire to thrive upon, and the "red flag" conditions to warn the public of the fire risk.

[tyrannical bastard 3955]

Here's a map from WMBB.  The extreme northeast corner of the evacuation area is where the transmitters are located.

 

EDIT:  The transmitters are located near the intersection of Waller Road & Scotts Ferry Road and are just off the road that comes off of Waller.  So they technically may be out of the zone itself, but the guy wires may extend into the fringe of it.

 

The evacuation was called for this area since the massive Bertha Fire is SSE of this area and the winds are targeted to this area.