MA: Building Flooding Forces Cumulus Stations Off Air

Three Worcester, MA stations were forced off-air Thursday thanks to a burst water pipe that sent morning show hosts — and others in the building — "running for their lives."

According to Telegram,com, employees of businesses inside 250 Commercial St. — including Cumulus Radio stations Classic Hits WWFX 100.1 FM /The Pike, WORD 98.9 FM /Nash Icon and HotAC WXLO 104.5 FM— initially thought the roof of the several-story brick building had collapsed.

However, it was a burst 6-inch water pipe that sent water cascading through the building, sending ceiling tiles and debris crashing into a vacant first-floor storefront and turning a glass-enclosed staircase into an aquarium.

Bruce Palmer was on air around 8:35 a.m. when he heard a thundering crash — a commotion loud enough to penetrate his soundproof studio.

"Someone looked outside the studio and saw ankle-deep water running down the hallway. We grabbed what we could and ran out of the building," Mr. Palmer said. "We are in soundproof rooms, and if you can hear something like thunder in that soundproof room, you know it's big."

The stations have automated systems, but with the power to the building having to be shut off, those systems could not work and all that was heard on the airwaves was dead air.

The Pike returned to the air around 12:30 p.m. All three stations were back on the air by 1:30 p.m.

Bob Goodell, vice president and market manager, said early Thursday afternoon he was planning to bring in generators to the building and run cords to the fifth and sixth floors to power up the stations.

However, Goodell said, the WXLO studio was heavily damaged and "is probably a loss," while The Pike and Nash Icon studios had minimal damage.

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