The bearing had been making noise for some time, and there were some fears that it might fall to the ground. No one would park their car anywhere near the tower. A lot of screeching and LOUD BANG. In the middle of the night. The bearing froze up and all 3 drive motors kicked in. The tower twisted and broke several steel crossbeams from the massive inertial torque. At least one (I think 2) of the solid copper fuse links in the overhead main power lines to the tower exploded. The antenna had a serious list to the left (seen from the ops Bldg). It was all quite exciting, but not unexpected.

A crane was hired from Panama City,FL (the closest one big enough) to remove the antenna. The decision was made to close the site in lieu of replacing the bearing. So everthing on site was yellow tagged and shipped out - except expendables which mostly went to Ft Rucker via a succession of Hueys.

-- Rick