Pyrite Chock:An Essential Protective Device For All Radio Stations-Saratan

Aug. 2,2010
Pyrite Chock: An Essential Protective Device For All Radio Stations-Saratan
By Quirico M. Gorpido, Jr.

Maasin City, Southern Leyte-Pyrite Chock, a blocking device of destructive electrical discharged from a lightning strike, is an essential invention needed for the protection of all radio stations in the country, either AMs or FMs.
This was the disclosure of Gaudencio “Jun” Saratan,a licensed radio operator who was once working at a local radio station DYDM.He is now working at the Saint Joseph College here in this ten-year-old small city.
The recent revelation of this piece of blocking device that would protect any stations from more damages from lightning strike cropped up when a transmitter of a newly-launched music station Viper FM in brgy. Ichon, Macrohon was allegedly hit by a lightning bolt sometime in June 2010.
This was also the day, Monday, when a cogon-roofed resthouse in brgy.Maria Clara owned by Christopher Plateros was burned when a fireball emanating from a lightning passed by it before hitting a coconut tree nearby into halves, as revealed by Maria Clara Chief Tanod Vicente Fernandez.
The intuition to verify an unofficial report received by a salesboy- friend at Lola Edad Beach Resort from one of Saludo Ice Plant workers, has urged this reporter to ask Chito Saludo, Viper FM’s Manager. However, for clarification he informed that the music station’s transmitter was safe and that it was the power source (transformer) installed by the SOLECO linemen that was hit by the lightning strike.
“After the lightning hit the transformer”, he said,” its electrical discharged ran towards the transmitter and damaged some of its parts”. Heard in the past that there exist an anti-lightning rod that would protect a radio transmitter from a lightning strike, I asked Jun Saratan if there really exist such kind of an invention, which I have not seen even once.
The licensed radio operator instead explained that the so-called anti-lightning rod is actually an 8 feet long, thumb-size rod made of copper called lightning arrester. He said that this device would be placed at the highest point of the radio station’s transmitter with a wire connection down to the ground.
Nevertheless, that is not enough, he said, saying that there’s another essential device that needs to be installed in wire connections which he called “pyrite chock” (mistakenly typed recently in a published report as “pyrite soap”).
He disclosed that “pyrite chock” is an invention from Germany and the USA that would block a destructive electrical discharged emanating from a lightning that would hit a transformer or any part of the wire connections in a radio station. “The installation of a pyrite chock in one, two or three wire connections”, he explained, “will block the destructive flow of electrical discharged from a lightning strike, thus minimizing its damaging effects to a certain radio station’s equipments. It is also of vital importance that if there are two or three wire connections towards the direction of the transmitter and two or three wire connections towards the radio station’s booth, then each wire connection should have a pyrite chock installed. The installation of this blocking device (isingsing ra na,a Cebuano statement uttered by Saratan,which is understandable among the Cebuano-speaking people, on how to install a pyrite chock on a wire connection),he said, should be placed just a few inches away from the power source.
Asked how he came to know about this important device or gadget, he divulged while he was working at DYDM he was one of those licensed radio operators or technicians who were sent to DZRH-Manila where a German expert has conducted a seminar on the importance of installing pyrite chock in all radio stations of the country.
Queried further if all licensed radio operators have the knowledge about the aforesaid device, he said that only those who were lucky to have attended such kind of seminar and that this gadget is not available in the Philippines, but only in Germany and the USA. It can be ordered, he said.
Saratan moreover implied, that if the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) officials who inspected Viper FM last year to see if the music station has met the requirements, did not forget to advise Viper FM’s management, or that Chito Saludo himself knows the necessary essentiality of installing pyrite chocks in all the wire connections, then the transmitter erected atop a nearby hill, would not be damaged.
He also hinted that any newly-constructed radio station should consult first a licensed radio operator or technician who is knowledgeable regarding on the details on how the pyrite chock be properly installed in wire connections.(Quirico M. Gorpido, Jr.)