A BLIND pensioner "liberated" by a lifetime of amateur radio antics will broadcast a special show from his home to celebrate the 150th anniversary of a sight loss charity.

Terry Robinson, from Crosshill, will take to the airwaves today to mark the Royal National Institute of Blind People Scotland’s birthday.

The 68-year-old radio enthusiast has been blind since childhood, but it did not stop him pursuing his love of communicating over the airwaves. The pensioner’s main interest is to contact others using special call signs, and he has already logged more than 2,000 contacts.

Terry said: “I’ve been interested in things technical from a very early age, often getting into trouble for fiddling with things that didn’t concern me.

“I was introduced to amateur radio by a senior boy at school whom I heard talking effortlessly to other amateurs in the USA. I decided I wanted a bit of that. I gained my full licence in 1967 at the ripe young age of 16.”

Since taking up amateur radio as a teenager, Terry felt liberated from his disability.

He added: “What amateur radio did for me as a teenager was liberate me from stigma, being seen as blind and different by people I didn’t know.

“I could go on air and talk to people and, unless they asked a question which I couldn’t answer without declaring that I was blind, nobody needed to know or care. And that helped me a lot as a teenager. In recognition of RNIB’s 150th anniversary, I thought it would be fun to get a special call-sign, so I sought GR150NIB. Ofcom doesn’t like issuing these call-signs unless we can persuade them that they’re for an event of national significance and are likely to broaden interest in the hobby.”

The RNIB, founded in1868, has improved the lives of countless blind Scots.