Completed fifty years ago, the mast was originally brought into service on July 30, 1974. Measuring a dizzying 646.38 meters in height, it was immediately inducted into the Guinness Book of Records as the planet’s tallest manmade object.
In fact, not until the Burj Khalifa tower in the UAE was built in 2009 would the world see anything as high.
Standing twice as high as Europe’s next tallest structure, the mast was located in Gąbin, a small town not far from Płock, north-west of Warsaw.
Necessitating it was Poland’s shifting post-war border. Prior to the mast’s creation, the Raszyn radio transmitter had served as the nation’s principal transmitter. However, when that was rebuilt in 1949 it was designed to cover Poland’s so-called Eastern Borderlands rather than ‘Recovered Territories’ in the north and west.
This inability to provide coverage across the whole country made Raszyn increasingly redundant, and in the late 1960s government officials opted to build a new transmitter capable of covering Poland in its entirety. Not only was Gąbin in the heart of the country, it also boasted high soil conductivity.
Breaking ground in 1969, three years later the foundations were complete and work on the mast began in earnest.
Designed by engineer Jan Polak, the slender mast weighed 420 tonnes and was composed of a lattice work of 86 triangular cross-sections.
Not only would it beam radio programs across the country, such was the tower’s capability that it was able to send out signals to parts of Africa, the Middle East and North America. This, reasoned officials, was needed so as to reach Poland’s diaspora.
Christened the Radiophonic Transmission Center Konstantynów – but also known as the Warsaw Radio Mast – the super tower even had an elevator to take employees to the top. Taking 45 minutes to reach the peak, it was designed by Swedish firm Alimak and could house three people – those that had the pleasure, remember conditions in the lift as being ‘cramped’.
This, though, was vastly preferable to the alternative: ladders, too, had also been fitted, though those using that option recall that this method would take in excess of two hours.
Staffed by 30 engineers, another 15 people were employed in administrative roles. Due to the specified nature of the work, these workers were recruited from around the country, and as such the government built them a separate housing block in Sochaczew, 30 kilometers to the south-east.
The chief designer, Polak, had visited the U.S. for ten days to boost his engineering knowledge and he would have been right to feel a certain element of pride when the mast was finally inaugurated.
Opening its broadcast history with twelve clock chimes from Warsaw’s Royal Castle clock tower – which itself had started working just days before – within minutes people as far afield as Iraq and Afghanistan were able to listen to Polskie Radio.
Yet even before its completion, the omens were not good. In one incident, a military pilot straining for a closer look flew too close and nearly collided with the mast. Others recall that even during construction, screws were being replaced after being identified as being too weak to hold.
Regardless of these matters, the tower was hailed as an engineering marvel and a testament to Poland’s engineering skill.
Of course, not everyone was happy. For years, locals complained about health issues, claiming the presence of the mast was responsible for a rise in cancer rates, mental disorders and infertility. Others blamed the mast for cows not giving milk. This sense of paranoia reached its peak in light of the Chernobyl disaster.
The tower would face its own reckoning just years after Chernobyl. With Poland’s communist government already collapsed and in ruin, the mast’s own demise in 1991 felt like a timely curtain call for a system that had proved itself to be as flimsy as a house of cards.
Years of technical neglect eventually caught up and on August 8, 1991, high winds saw the tower buckle and collapse within seconds. Fortunately, no-one was hurt. Today, parts of the ground facilities remain, and are visited by both ‘urbex’ urban explorers and those seeking to commemorate this strange yet largely unknown chapter of Polish history.
