Technical Details
Europe 1 is transmitted by Europäische Rundfunk- und Fernseh-AG (in English, European Radio and Television Company), broadcasting on longwave at 183 kHz from Felsberg in the Saarland and on FM frequencies throughout France.
The Felsberg antenna system beams Europe 1's signal southwestward towards France. In the easterly direction, transmissions are attenuated, so, in Eastern Europe, only a weak signal can be heard. However, because of a defect in the antenna system, only the carrier frequency is properly screened to the east; the sidebands suffer less attenuation, so that, in the east, sideband reception is adequate (especially if using an SSB receiver) but distorted. Following the collapse of one mast in the four-mast phased array on October 8th 2012, the two-mast reserve antenna has been in use, resulting in a reduced signal in parts of France but a stronger and undistorted signal in northern Europe and the British Isles
Carrier frequencies on the longwave band are assigned as integer multiples of nine kHz ranging from 153 to 279 kHz. However, the Europe 1 transmitter's frequency, 183 kHz, is offset from the usual nine kHz multiples established under the Geneva Plan. This is to minimise interference with a transmitter in Oranienburg, which broadcasts Deutschlandradio Kultur on 177 kHz. Europe 1 and Deutschlandradio Kultur straddle the standard 180 kHz frequency which would normally be assigned to one or the other under the Geneva Plan.
In Felsberg, the four guyed antenna masts which were erected in 1954 and 1955 average 277 metres in height. The building where the transmitters are housed is an architecturally unusual, prestressed-concrete construction that needs no internal supporting columns. It has been designated an architectural monument by the European Union and is a protected structure.
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