Hospital Radio Burnley

Celebrating over '50' years entertaining the community

Welcome to
Hospital Radio Burnley

The official aim and objective of Radio Burnley is "to mitigate the effect and aid in the recovery of the infirmed and all that are hospitalised within the area by providing a broadcast service".

Unofficially, this means that we appreciate that some of you have to stay in bed longer than usual during your recuperation and when you are fed up of watching nurses emptying bed pans and domestics sweeping the floors, god bless them all, we can help by providing a variety of programmes seven day a week 365 days a year.

From it's inception in 1957, at the now defunct Victoria Hospital, we moved during the early seventies to the old chapel in the grounds of Burnley General Hospital and then to studio's adjacent to the concert hall in 1986. We have finally found a permenant home underneath the Edith Watson Maternity block in 2007.

We have recently purchased some brand new equipment to compliment the move. and have two studios equipped to BBC broadcasting standards and under certain conditions and a good following wind, we can broadcast from anywhere on the planet.

We invited our very good friend, Julie Hesmondalgh, to officially open the new studios, which, happened to coincide with our 50th birthday.

In our programme schedules we are concentrating on trying to provide uninterrupted programmes 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

Stay Tuned

Hospital Radio Burnley, in the grounds of Burnley General Hospital and in the shadow of Pendle Hill famed for its witches, broadcasts a multitude of programmes to satisfy every taste in music and can be received on 'Channel 1' on the Patientline system, there is also a free phone number on the Patientline terminals from where you can contact the studios directly...*800 (star eight zero zero)

All the staff at Hospital Radio Burnley are volunteers and give their time freely.  
HRB is a member of the hospital broadcasting association

World record

In 2001 we attempted to break the world record for the longest broadcast by an individual. It took about six months to plan and get everything in place, the rules of the attempt were so stringent for example, the records that could be played had to be not less than two minutes and not more than six minutes in duration. The person who was attempting to break the record, could only have 15 minutes break in eight hours. the idea for this event was the brainchild of our very own Mr. Charlie Tuna. selecting the person to try and break the record was easy...Charlie Tuna suggested it...Charlie Tuna could do it.

This challenge was to boost the coffers of the station. The whole town got behind us by buying a badge of support for £1 and their name would be entered into a draw for a cash prize. Local companies were ask to sponsor the record attempt...and they did... in numbers.
 
On the 10th of March 2001 at 10am the challenge started, the first record played was started by the then Mayor of Burnley Councillor Mr. Rafique Malik. The funny thing was that as the challenge was being planned all the presenters assumed fishy or oceanic names, Barry Cuda, Rocky Shorr, Sue Shee to name but a few. We took the record away from a presenter from the Ukraine. Since then the Americans, The Australians and the Canadians have tried and have failed to break our record. The record was finally wrenched from our grasp by the Swedish (well done mate). Along the way we have gained a lot of famous friends, Julie Hesmondhalgh (Hayley Cropper from Corrie), Tony Berry (from the Houghton Weavers) Tony Thorpe (from the Rubettes) but with respect to these people our biggest catch has been Sir Anthony Hopkins.

Click on the poster or piccy