The Electronic Disease

Model planes go catatonic in midflight. Automatic garage doors open mysteriously in the night. Truckers' chatter interrupts ministers' sermons over church public address systems. Traffic lights go berserk. TV pictures flutter. And a solid-state sewing machine suddenly shouts to a startled Indiana housewife the password of the invading force, "Breaker! Breaker!" These strange goings-on are caused not by UFOs or other extraterrestrial goblins, but by RFI (radio frequency interference), an electronic epidemic spread by the nation's 15 million Citizens Band radios (TIME, May 10).

The populist community of the air --using many CB sets with illegally high power output--has overflowed the banks of its 23 federally assigned channels, filling the air with errant electromagnetic waves. Complaints from TV, radio and even stereo users are flooding Federal Communications Commission offices across the land. Some vigilantes with axes and sledges have invaded base stations (home-based CB transmitters) to smash offending sets.

To forestall further violence, FCC is working to increase the number of available CB channels, while Congress is considering legislation by Ohio Representative Charles A. Vanik that would require manufacturers to install filters on all new TV and radio sets as a shield against RFI. But nature may have the last word. By 1978, increasing sunspot activity may cause atmospheric changes that could interfere with, and sometimes blot out CB transmissions.

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