Radio City (pirate radio station) Radio City (pirate radio station) Radio City was a British pirate radio station broadcasting from Shivering Sands Army Fort, one of the abandoned Second World War Maunsell Sea Forts in the Thames Estuary. In 1964, following the launch of Radio Caroline, Screaming Lord Sutch said he would start his own station. On 27 May Radio Sutch began broadcasting on 194 metres (announced as 197), 1542 kHz, from the south tower of Shivering Sands. It was a low-powered, low-budget operation. The transmitter, from a Handley Page Halifax bomber, was powered with a cascade of car batteries, a scaffold pole with a
Pirate radio in the United Kingdom a pirate radio station required a good quality cassette recorder, a transmitter and a high roof, with tower blocks providing the ideal transmission site for pirate radio stations. A 40 watt transmitter broadcasting from the roof of a fifteen-storey tower block could reach a forty-mile radius. Radio shows were often pre-recorded at home, with the pirate radio station operators setting up temporary transmitters on the roof of tower blocks. The 1970s and 1980s saw a wave of landbased pirate radio, broadcasting mostly in big cities. These included community-focused local stations such as Sunshine Radio in Shropshire and Radio Jackie in