Record breaking radio interview across Somer Valley

AFTER more than 31 hours together in a radio studio, a Somer FM radio presenter and his charity interviewee have together broken the Guinness World Record for the Longest Radio Interview.

Jamie Skinner and Meg Abernethy-Hope broadcast for 31 hours and 28 minutes beating the previous record set two years ago by just 3 minutes.

Starting at 9am on Saturday September 12, the pair spent most of the time chatting with just five minutes breaks allowed every uninterrupted hour to play some ‘lift music’.

The presenter said: “It was Meg who was going through the hard stuff. She was the one who had to do most of the talking. She did the emotional outpouring.”

Meg was representing her chosen charity BillyChip; a homelessness and social outreach charity she co-founded in memory of her brother Billy who passed away in a motorbike accident.

The charity provides BillyChip tokens given to people experiencing homelessness and exchanged at participating outlets for drinks and food.

For Jamie, more than 31 hours broadcasting was a bit of blur with the days rolling into each other.

He explained: “It's weird how much you forget from being awake in a way. Everything seemed to blend into one big clump eventually.

“By the time we ended on Sunday, it still feels like Saturday because you've not slept. Your body hasn't had a chance to kind of calibrate to a new day.”

The idea to go for the world record came to him last year and he admits was a bit idiotic, even for him.

He said: “I started the year writing a book. And then, in the ultimate act of procrastination and after a kind of crisis, I joked about it on the radio show I do at the end of last year.

“I sent a voice message eventually to one of the directors of the station. And they went, yeah, possibly.”

That possibly turned into probably but it was still hard to track down people needed to witness the event.

Jamie said: “We spent a good couple of months trying to get witnesses; the witnesses were the most difficult point.”

Signing up to take four hour shifts, witnesses were dropping out and it was touch and go admits Jamie with everyone finally locked in and ready just 13 hours before the duo were due on air.

They hope to raise £5,000 for Billy Chip and Jamie’s chosen charity, Beyond, a mental health charity for young people which is trying to expand the work they do in schools to create understanding, particularly early on.

Jamie says he wished there had been something like that when he was a teenager.

“They've got a wonderful video called ‘I wish you knew’. And it really hit me because, it just felt exactly like what I would have liked or probably needed at that time,” he added.

As they await the verification of the attempt by Guinness World Records, would he do it all over again?

He laughs: “If they got 50 hours, I would go, no, you can have your record!”