WLOS

WLOS

Asheville, North Carolina- Greenville/Spartanburg/ Anderson, South Carolina
City of license	Asheville
Branding	WLOS ABC 13 HD (general) ABC 13 News (news) WMYA My 40 HD (on DT2)
Slogan	Western North Carolina's News Leader
Channels	Digital: 13 (VHF)
Affiliations	13.1 ABC HD 13.2 MyNetworkTV 13.3 ABC SD
Owner	Sinclair Broadcast Group (WLOS Licensee, LLC)
First air date	September 18, 1954
Call letters' meaning	Wonderful Land Of Sky
Sister station(s)	WMYA-TV, WXLV-TV, WMYV, WRDC, WLFL
Former callsigns	WLOS-TV (1954-1984)
Former channel number(s)	Analog: 13 (VHF, 1954-2009) Digital: 56 (UHF)
Transmitter power	50 kW
Height	849.4 m
Facility ID	56537
Transmitter coordinates	35°25′32″N 82°45′25″W
Website	WLOS.com

WLOS is the ABC-affiliated television station for Western North Carolina and Upstate South Carolina licensed to Asheville, North Carolina. It broadcasts a high definition digital signal on VHF channel 13 from a transmitter on Mount Pisgah in North Carolina. The station can also be seen on Charter channel 3 (in North Carolina) and channel 13 (in South Carolina). There is a high definition feed offered on Charter digital channel 703 (in North Carolina) and digital channel 713 (in South Carolina).

Owned by the Sinclair Broadcast Group, WLOS operates MyNetworkTV affiliate WMYA-TV (owned by Cunningham Broadcasting) through a local marketing agreement (LMA). The two share studios on Technology Drive in Asheville near I-26/US 74. Syndicated programming on this channel includes: Wheel of Fortune, Jeopardy!, Swift Justice with Jackie Glass, and Anderson. It is one of three Sinclair duopolies in North Carolina.

Translators

In addition to its main signal, WLOS operates a network of analog translators throughout the mountains of Western North Carolina. Due to low-powered status, these were exempt from transitioning to digital on June 12, 2009.

City of license	Callsign	Transmitter location
Tryon	W05AC	Tryon Peak
Cherokee	W05AF
Spruce Pine	W06AD	along US 19E
Bat Cave	W06AQ	Chimney Rock
Bryson City	W08AN	west of town
Marion	W10AP	south of downtown
Franklin	W11AJ	Winespring Bald
Waynesville	W12AR	west of town
Black Mountain	W12AQ	west of downtown
Burnsville	W12AU	Phillips Knob

History

The station began broadcasting an analog signal on VHF channel 13 at 316,000 watts on September 18, 1954. It was owned by the Skyway Broadcasting Company along with WLOS radio (1380 AM, now WKJV; and FM 99.9, now WKSF). It has always been an ABC affiliate and is the second-longest tenured primary ABC affiliate south of Washington, D.C. (behind Lynchburg, Virginia's WSET-TV, coincidentally also on channel 13). During the late-1950s, WLOS was also briefly affiliated with the NTA Film Network. The studios and transmitter were located in West Asheville (the old 300-foot (91 m) self-supporting tower with its analog batwing antenna is still standing) along with its radio sisters. A few months after the station signed on, the television studios were moved to Battle House (a restored mansion on Macon Avenue northeast of Downtown Asheville) next to the historic Grove Park Inn.

At that same time, the transmitter was moved to the much-higher Mount Pisgah 35 miles (56 km) distant. Due to the higher elevation, the FCC reduced its effective radiating power by half. But even with its power reduced to 178,000 watts, the station still more than doubled its coverage area to include most of Western North Carolina and Upstate South Carolina. Soon afterward, the FCC combined the western Carolinas into one giant market with WLOS as the primary ABC affiliate. With its move to Mount Pisgah, the station could now boast the second highest transmitter location east of the Mississippi River at 2,804 feet (855 m) above average terrain (the valley floor) and 6,056 feet (1,846 m) above sea level. At the time, first place belonged to WMTW-TV atop Mount Washington, New Hampshire at 3,871 feet (1,180 m) above average terrain (the valley floor), and 6,374 feet (1,943 m) above sea level.

The new tower location gave WLOS bragging rights to one of the largest coverage areas in the nation. In addition to its primary coverage area of the Western Carolinas, the station also had significant viewership in several other nearby markets as well. WLOS also enjoyed at least secondary coverage in portions of Eastern Tennessee, Southwestern Virginia, and Southeastern Kentucky. It provided city-grade coverage to nearly all of the Tri-Cities market and Grade B coverage of most of the Knoxville market. Channel 13 could also be seen in portions of Georgia under the right conditions.

Before the mid to late-1960s, no other full-time ABC affiliate put a clear signal into much of this area. Before WKPT-TV signed on to serve the Tri-Cities, WLOS claimed the Tri-Cities as part of its primary coverage area. Even after WKPT signed on as an ABC affiliate, WLOS was available on cable in the Tri-Cities well into the 1980s. Indeed, many viewers in the Tri-Cities and the eastern part of the Knoxville market received a better over-the-air signal from WLOS than Knoxville's WTVK (now CBS affiliate WVLT-TV) and WKPT both of which were on UHF and did not get much penetration in the largely mountainous coverage areas. UHF stations, then as now, do not get good reception in rugged terrain. Until the 1990s, the station was also carried on several separately-owned municipal translator stations in Eastern Kentucky.

The station long had significant viewership in the Charlotte area. Until WSOC-TV switched from NBC to ABC in 1978, it was the de facto primary ABC affiliate for the western portion of the Charlotte market. WLOS appeared in the Charlotte Observer television listings for many years (though it was dropped from the weekly listings in the mid-1990s) and advertised its programs in Charlotte-area newspapers well into the 1970s. It is still available on many cable systems in the western portion of the Charlotte market.

As mentioned above, WLOS now owns and operates ten analog translators that rebroadcast its digital signal. WLOS' only ABC competition came from WAIM-TV in Anderson, South Carolina (now WMYA) which also carried a few CBS programs. WAIM had been the default ABC affiliate for the Upstate until WLOS' massive power boost. Unfortunately, that channel only provided a reliable signal to Anderson itself and nearby Pickens County, South Carolina. However, it still continued to air some ABC programming. WLOS pressured ABC to drop its programming from WAIM from the 1960s onward finally succeeding in 1979.

In 1958, this station was purchased by Wometco Enterprises of Miami, Florida (a movie theater company and former owner of the Blue Circle hamburger chain) which promptly sold the AM station. The company operated both the television and FM stations as Wometco-Skyway Broadcasting until 1984 when it was sold to the investment firm Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. (also known as KKR). The FM station was also sold at this time and its antenna remained co-located on the Mount Pisgah tower. The station was later sold to Anchor Media which in turn was later sold to River City Broadcasting. That company merged with the Sinclair Broadcast Group in 1996.

On January 5, 2007, Mediacom dropped all Sinclair-controlled stations including WLOS and WMYA from its systems because of a dispute over compensation. Mediacom is the cable provider for much of Western North Carolina (though not Asheville itself), leaving much of WLOS' viewing area without ABC until the dispute was resolved a month later. Additionally, Charter briefly dropped WLOS-DT because of compensation disputes.

Originally, WLOS aired its digital signal at 834.7 kilowatts on UHF channel 56. However, the high UHF band (channels 52 to 69) was dropped from broadcast use after the February 17, 2009 cutoff date for analog broadcasting. As a result, it moved its digital broadcasts back to its previous analog channel number, 13. After the DTV Delay Act postponed the date to June 12, WLOS intended to keep the original date on February 17 but on February 12 the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) said stations must justify using the early cutoff date. On February 13, General Manager Jack Connors announced the FCC would also make WLOS end analog broadcasts on its translators leaving many in the mountainous area without a signal. In 2000, the station made its much-anticipated move to new studios at Technology Drive about 10 miles (16 km) south of Downtown Asheville. Station personnel could now brag about the much shorter driving distance for sales calls and news team coverage to Greenville and Spartanburg, South Carolina.

Digital Television

Channel	Programming
13.1	Main WLOS programming / ABC
13.2	SD simulcast of WMYA / MyNetworkTV
13.3	SD simulcast of 13.1

WMYA's over-the-air signal only provides Grade B coverage to the North Carolina side of the market. To improve that station's over-the-air coverage, WLOS offers an SD simulcast on their second digital subchannel. On WLOS-DT3 is an SD simulcast of the main channel. As of November 5, 2010, WLOS is the only Sinclair-owned station that is broadcasting on the VHF dial.

Out-of-market cable carriage

In recent years, WLOS has been carried on cable in multiple areas outside of the Asheville media market. That includes cable systems within the Charlotte and Chattanooga, TN markets in North Carolina, the Aiken and Columbia markets in South Carolina, the Atlanta market in Georgia, the Knoxville market in Tennessee, and the Tri-Cities market in Tennessee and Virginia.

Programming

Despite being an ABC affiliate, WLOS has pre-empted a fair amount of network programming over the years. The station has been the home of popular syndicated game shows Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy! since 1985. Prior to that, WYFF aired both programs. The station also produced a local children's show called Mr. Bill and Bozo starring now retired weathermen Bill Norwood and Bob Caldwell (who celebrated his 40th anniversary on the air at WLOS in June 2006). Another popular program on WLOS was Shock Theater, a Saturday afternoon series of black-and-white science-fiction movies from the Warner Brothers/Columbia Pictures/Universal Studios collections of the 1950s. This show was also hosted by Bill Norwood dressed as a Dracula-type character similar to the "Doctor Shock" character at WTVC-TV in Chattanooga of the same era. The channel began broadcasting 24 hours a day 7 days a week between late-2005 and early-2006 having previously signed-off early Saturday mornings from 5 to 6 after the late movie. It may still put up color bars for a few minutes if the movie ends early but otherwise airs paid programming.

WLOS also signed-off every weeknight until 1992 with the introduction of ABC News' overnight newscast World News Now. Later on, the station signed-off late Friday night/early Saturday morning and late Saturday night/early Sunday morning until the early-2000s. According to a particular sign-off clip from 1988, the sign-offs back then included the national anthem played by the Madison County, North Carolina high school band while the color bars afterwords said "Good Morning, 13 WLOS-TV, Asheville, North Carolina". After that, the sign-offs included Sandi Patty's rendition of The Star-Spangled Banner with a video of different people saluting the flag followed by shots of newspaper presses and people voting with ballots. These years used a color version of the Indian-head test pattern and in the center said "13 WLOS Asheville-Greenville-Spartanburg".

ABC programming that has been preempted on WLOS includes:

• Dark Shadows (a popular cult-favorite soap opera on ABC from 1966-1971, it was cleared on April 1, 1968)
• The Edge of Night (a soap opera broadcast on ABC from 1975-1984)
• Fudge
• One Life to Live (early years, replaced with reruns of The Flintstones, the station began clearing the program in 1973 and remained on the station until it ended on January 13, 2012) Peabo Bryson who sung the 1985-1991 theme song is a native of Greenville, South Carolina.
• Ryan's Hope (during the later years of the show)
• ABC Evening News (around the late-1960s to early-1970s replaced with I Love Lucy reruns but was cleared beginning in 1970)
• All American Girl (a sitcom featuring the first Asian family as main characters on a network program, WLOS did not clear this program during its entire run)
• Thunder Alley
• Mike and Maty (replaced by The Jerry Springer Show)
• Full House (some episodes)
• America's Funniest Home Videos (some episodes)
• Dinosaurs (some episodes)
• The Critic (some episodes, replaced with syndicated reruns of Murphy Brown or local programs)
• the first season of The Drew Carey Show (replaced with reruns of Murphy Brown, the station cleared Drew Carey in 1996)
• first three seasons of The View (replaced with The Jerry Springer Show, The View was cleared by WLOS in September 2000)
• a 2004 airing of Nightline which paid tribute to the soldiers killed in the 2003 invasion and occupation of Iraq (pre-empted on orders from the Sinclair Broadcast Group, seen instead on WHNS)
• a 2004 airing of the movie Saving Private Ryan (pre-empted on orders from the Sinclair Broadcast Group)
• WLOS is one of few ABC affiliates that do not clear the Litton's Weekend Adventure block on ABC every Saturday Mornings. This is the first time WLOS pre-empted an ABC network progam on a permanent basis since the early 2000s.
• WLOS didn't air the ABC Sports coverage of the final day of the 2004 Deutsche Bank Championship on Labor Day due to airing that years MDA Telethon. As a result, it was seen instead on WHNS (with ABC's consent). Ironically, Bill Haas who was in third place in that game happens to be a resident of Greenville, South Carolina.

News operation

Nightly news open at 11.

Traditionally, WLOS' newscasts have focused more on the North Carolina side of its sprawling market typically offering more stories from Asheville and the surrounding area. Its ratings tend to be higher in Western North Carolina which is evident in the station's current on-air slogan. In terms of the entire market, WSPA is currently the top rated station winning most broadcasts. Specifically, that channel's weeknight show at 11 is the highest ranked after experiencing tremendous growth. On September 17, 2008, WLOS and WMYA began offering local news in high definition becoming the second pair of stations in the area to upgrade after WSPA and WYCW.

WMYA produces two weekday newscasts. Two half-hour shows weeknights at 6:30 and 10. The earlier program airs against the big three network evening news while the prime time broadcast competes with shows on WYCW and WHNS. On April 7th 2008 News 13 added traffic reporting for Western North Carolina and the Upstate of SC. Also on March 28th 2011 WLOS began broadcasting their "News 13 Early edition" @ 4:30am.

In addition to its main studios, WLOS operates news bureaus in Greenville, South Carolina (on Verdae Boulevard) and in Waynesville, North Carolina (on South Main Street/US 23).

Newscast titles

• Your Esso Reporter (1953-1957)
• The Night Report (1957-late 1960s)
• NewsScope (late 1960s-1970s)
• Your World Today/Your World Tonight (1970s)
• The Carolinas Today/News '75 ('76) (1975-1976)
• Dateline 13 News (1977-early 1980s)
• NewsWatch 13 (early 1980s-1984)
• News 13 (1984-present)

Station slogans

• "13 Country and You" (1970s)
• "The News People" (1977-1979)
• "Count on 13" (1984-1988 and 1988-1993)
• "Turn to 13 Together" (1988, used during Frank Gari's "Turn To News" period)
• "TV is Good, on ABC-13" (1997-1998)
• "We Love TV, on ABC-13" (1998-1999)
• "Western North Carolina's News Leader" (1998-present)

Station News Music Packages

• Turn to News 1984-1988 Gari Communications
• First News 1993-1995 Non-Stop Music
• Counterpoint 1995-1998 Stephen Arnold Music
• Image News 1998-2002 Gari Communications, INC
• Sinclair News Package 2002-2006 Stephen Arnold Music
• Daily News 2006-present Gari Communications, INC

News Team

Anchors

• Holly Headrick - weekday mornings (on WLOS) and reporter
  • "Fugitive Files" segment producer
• Jay Siltzer - weekday mornings and health reporter weeknights at 5
  • fill-in meteorologist
• Victoria Dunkle - weekday mornings and noon
  • "Craft Corner" segment producer
• Tammy Watford - weeknights at 5, 5:30, and 6:30
  • "Never Stop Learning" segment producer
• Darcel Grimes - weeknights at 5, 6, 10, and 11
• Frank Fraboni - weeknights at 5:30 and 6:30
• Larry Blunt - weeknights at 6 and 11
  • "Person of the Week" segment producer
• Russ Bowen - weeknights at 10 and reporter
• Katie Killen - weekend mornings (6-8 a.m.)
• Frank Kracher - weekend evenings and weeknight reporter

News 13 Sky Watch Meteorologists

• Jason Boyer (AMS Seal of Approval) - Chief Meteorologist seen weeknights
• Julie Wunder (AMS and NWA Seals of Approval) - weekday mornings and noon
  • "One Day Wunders", "Carolina Kitchen", and "Pet Pals" segments producer
• Karen Wynne (AMS and NWA Seals of Approval) - weekends and environmental reporter

Sports

• Stan Pamfilis - Sports Director seen weeknights 6, 6:30, 10, and 11
• Jared Fialko - weekends and sports reporter

Reporters

• Ingrid Allstaedt - Rutherford, Polk, and McDowell Counties
• Sherrill Barber - Henderson and Transylvania Counties
• John Le - "Absolute Le" segment producer
• Megan Schiering - weekday afternoons
• Rex Hodge - Waynesville Bureau
• Katie Killen - Rutherford County
• Mario Boone
• Emma Wright
• George Sheldon - Traffic Reporter
• Merritt Youngdeer - Fill in Traffic Reporter

Notable Former AirStaff

• Mike Bettes - Meteorologist (now at The Weather Channel)
• Keith Taylor - Weekend Sports
• Scott Palmer - Anchor
• David Steele - Sports Director
• Pat Simon - Anchor (now at KSLA)

External links

• WLOS.com (Official WLOS-TV Website)
• My40.tv (Official WMYA-TV Website)
• Query the FCC's TV station database for WLOS