Rugby transmitting station

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A view of the tallest masts (alternative view)

The Rugby transmitting station was a large very low frequency (VLF) transmission facility near the town of Rugby, Warwickshire in England, situated just west of the A5 trunk road and in later years junction 18 of the M1 motorway. It came into service on January 1, 1926 and was originally used to transmit telegraph messages to the Commonwealth. After the 1950s this transmitter, active as callsign GBR (short for Great Britain) on 16 kHz, was used for transmitting messages to submerged submarines. The GBR transmitter was shutdown on April 1, 2003 after the Royal Navy decided not to renew its contract with BT^{[citation needed]} in favour of a new contract with VT Communications.

In 1927, a second transmitter was installed to initiate the first transatlantic commercial telephone service;linking New York and London on 60 kHz using single-sideband modulation. This transmitter was decommissioned in 1956 and became the time signal transmitter MSF. This new function developed from the decision, in 1951, to use the station to transmit modulated standard frequencies for scientific reference purposes. In 1972 these transmissions were consolidated onto the present frequency of 60 kHz and a further reference, that of a time signal, was added. In 1977 this took the form of the rolling slow code in use until April 2007, when BT's contract to transmit the time signal also passed to VT Communications, using their Anthorn transmitting station in Cumbria.

The aerial system at the VLF transmitter existed between 1926 and 2004 and consisted of twelve 250 metre (820 ft) high, guyed steel-framework masts insulated against ground and carrying an aerial wire. This wire was mainly destroyed by heavy iceloads in the winter of 1940. From the shutdown of GBR, the facility was only used for transmitting the MSF time signal. Therefore, 8 of the 12 masts were obsolete and demolished on the night of June 19, 2004 to June 20, 2004.

The remaining four 'tall' masts were demolished on the afternoon (around 1500hrs local time) of August 2, 2007 - with no prior publicity of this end of an era.

A trial transmission of the LORAN-C navigation system was run at the station from June 2005 until March 2007.