CIEL-FM is a

French-language French ( or ) is a Romance language of the Indo-European family. Like all other Romance languages, it descended from the Vulgar Latin of the Roman Empire. French evolved from Northern Old Gallo-Romance, a descendant of the Latin spoken in ...

Canadian Canadians () are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of their being ''C ...

radio station Radio broadcasting is the broadcasting of audio (sound), sometimes with related metadata, by radio waves to radio receivers belonging to a public audience. In terrestrial radio broadcasting the radio waves are broadcast by a land-based rad ...

located in

Rivière-du-Loup Rivière-du-Loup (; 2021 population 20,118) is a small city (Quebec), city on the south shore of the Saint Lawrence River in Quebec. The city is the seat for the Rivière-du-Loup Regional County Municipality and the Judicial districts of Quebec ...

Quebec Quebec is Canada's List of Canadian provinces and territories by area, largest province by area. Located in Central Canada, the province shares borders with the provinces of Ontario to the west, Newfoundland and Labrador to the northeast, ...

. Owned and operated by Radio CJFP (1986) ltée (part of the Groupe Radio Simard), it broadcasts on 103.7

MHz The hertz (symbol: Hz) is the unit of frequency in the International System of Units (SI), often described as being equivalent to one event (or cycle) per second. The hertz is an SI derived unit whose formal expression in terms of SI base u ...

with an

effective radiated power Effective radiated power (ERP), synonymous with equivalent radiated power, is an IEEE standardized definition of directional radio frequency (RF) power, such as that emitted by a radio transmitter. It is the total power in watts that would ha ...

of 60,000

watt The watt (symbol: W) is the unit of Power (physics), power or radiant flux in the International System of Units (SI), equal to 1 joule per second or 1 kg⋅m2⋅s−3. It is used to quantification (science), quantify the rate of Work ...

s using an

omnidirectional antenna In radio communication, an omnidirectional antenna is a class of antenna (electronics), antenna which radiates equal radio power in all directions perpendicular to an Cartesian coordinate system, axis (azimuthal directions), with power varying wi ...

( class C). The station has an

adult contemporary Adult contemporary music (AC) is a form of radio-played popular music, ranging from 1960s vocal and 1970s soft rock music to predominantly ballad-heavy music of the 1980s to the present day, with varying degrees of easy listening, pop, soul ...

format under the ''CIEL'' branding. However, the station has some

oldies Oldies is a term for musical genres such as pop music, rock and roll, doo-wop, surf music from the second half of the 20th century, specifically from around the mid-1950s to the 1980s, as well as for a radio format playing this music. Since 2 ...

programming, during weekends. The station was originally known as CJFP and went on the air on April 13, 1947 Larouche, Marc. "CJFP devient CIEL-FM", Le Soleil, May 7, 2001, pg. A-4. as an AM station broadcasting on 1400

kHz The hertz (symbol: Hz) is the unit of frequency in the International System of Units (SI), often described as being equivalent to one event (or cycle) per second. The hertz is an SI derived unit whose formal expression in terms of SI base uni ...

. From 1984 until the station's move to FM in 1994, it was one of the few AM stations authorized to increase its power at night, due to

NARBA The North American Regional Broadcasting Agreement (NARBA, ; ) refers to a series of international treaties that defined technical standards for AM band (mediumwave) radio stations. These agreements also addressed how frequency assignments were d ...

amendments which authorized all stations on "graveyard" ( class C) channels to quadruple their nighttime power. CJFP actually became the most powerful station in all of

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere, Northern and Western Hemisphere, Western hemispheres. North America is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South Ameri ...

among those stations, as it was authorized to broadcast with 10,000 watts during the day and 20,000 watts (directional) at night; however, this did not actually result in good coverage at night due to massive co-channel interference.Decision CRTC 94-736
/ref> The FM signal went on the air on December 15, 1994 and the AM signal went off the air in June 1995. Because the station already had an FM

sister station In broadcasting, sister stations or sister channels are radio or television stations operated by the same company, either by direct ownership or through a management agreement. Radio sister stations will often have different formats, and somet ...

, namely CIBM-FM (at the time,

Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC; ) is a public organization in Canada tasked with the mandate as a regulatory agency tribunal for various electronic communications, covering broadcasting and telecommunic ...

(CRTC) regulations generally forbade broadcasters to operate more than one AM station and one FM station per market), CJFP-FM originally operated under a condition of licence which required at least half of the programming to be "spoken-word programming" (i.e., talk). As such, CJFP-FM became the first privately owned French-language FM station to broadcast mainly talk programming; most of that talk programming came from the Radiomédia network. The station abandoned most of its talk programming, adopting a full-time

format, and changed its

call sign In broadcasting and radio communications, a call sign (also known as a call name or call letters—and historically as a call signal—or abbreviated as a call) is a unique identifier for a transmitter station. A call sign can be formally as ...

to CIEL-FM, effective September 1, 2001. That call sign was used, until August 2000, on a Montreal-area station now known as

CHMP-FM CHMP-FM (98.5 Hertz, MHz) is a French language talk radio, talk radio station serving the Greater Montreal Area and licensed to the off-Island suburb of Longueuil, Quebec, Longueuil. Owned and operated by Cogeco, it broadcasts with an effective r ...

, which coincidentally now has a talk format.

Transmitters

CIEL-FM-1 went on the air when CJFP moved to FM. CIEL-FM-3 replaced CJAF in 1996, and CIEL-FM-5 went on the air in 2001. Another rebroadcaster, CHRT 1450 in

Pohénégamook Pohénégamook (; pop. 2481) is a Canadian town on the Canada–United States border in Quebec's Témiscouata Regional County Municipality. The town shares the border with Estcourt Station, Maine, the northernmost point in New England. As of ...

, was shut down when the station's main FM signal was implemented. There is a station in Trois-Pistoles which uses the call sign CIEL-FM-4 (formerly CJTF-FM), but since 1997 it is no longer a rebroadcaster of CIEL.Decision CRTC 97-114
renewed under its new call sign i

/ref>

References

External links

CIEL

CIEL-FM
at The History of Canadian Broadcasting by the

Canadian Communications Foundation The Canadian Communications Foundation (CCF) was a Canadian nonprofit organization which documented the history of broadcasting in Canada, particularly radio and television networks, programs and broadcasters. The organization was established in ...

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Ciel-Fm

Iel ( or ) is a neopronoun in the French language intended as an alternative to the gender-specific pronouns ("She (pronoun), she") and ("He (pronoun), he"). It has been adopted by the Dictionnaires Le Robert, Le Robert dictionary but is not offici ...

Mass media in Rivière-du-Loup

Radio stations established in 1947 1947 establishments in Quebec