KUSA-TV

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KUSA-TV

Denver, Colorado
Branding	9 NEWS
Slogan	Where News Comes First / Colorado's News Leader
Channels	9 (VHF) analog, 16 (UHF) digital
Affiliations	NBC (secondary 1952-1953, full time 1995-present) NBC Weather Plus (on DT2)
Owner	Gannett
Founded	October 12, 1952
Call letters meaning	K United States of America
Former callsigns	KBTV (1952-84)
Former affiliations	ABC (1952-95) CBS (1952-1953, possibly primary)
Transmitter Power	316 kW/320 m(analog) 80 kW/303 m (digital)
Website	9news.com

KUSA-TV is an NBC affiliated television station broadcasting on VHF channel 9 (187.25 MHz video / 191.75 MHz audio). The station is based in Denver, Colorado and is owned by Gannett. KUSA, which is known on-air as "9 NEWS", is sister station to KTVD channel 20, Denver's MyNetworkTV affiliate. KTVD is housed and operated out of KUSA's high definition studios. KUSA's transmitter is located in Golden, Colorado.

KUSA produces nearly 49 hours of local news a week and has been the highest-rated news station in Denver for over a quarter-century. It is currently the only Denver station that broadcasts local news in HDTV. KUSA also owns the market's first high definition helicopter, "SKY 9", which it shares with KOA-AM "News Radio 850". KUSA produces two weekday and five weekend newscasts for its sister station, KTVD.

1 History
2 News Operations
- 2.1 Newscasts
3 News Team
- 3.1 Former Personalities
4 External Links

[edit] History

The station first went on the air on October 12, 1952 as KBTV, the second television station in the state of Colorado (KFEL-TV, now KWGN, also in Denver, was first by about three months). It was an ABC affiliate owned by Mullins Broadcasting. In 1979, the station was sold to Combined Communications Corp., and it became a Gannett-owned station later that year, following the merger of Gannett and Combined. The station changed its call letters to the current KUSA-TV on March 19, 1984.

In 1995, Denver's longtime NBC affiliate, KCNC-TV, was sold to Westinghouse and became a CBS affiliate as a result of an affiliation deal between Westinghouse and CBS. t the same time, McGraw-Hill, owner of longtime CBS affiliate KMGH-TV, cut an affiliation deal with ABC. As a result, KUSA joined NBC on September 10, 1995. When KUSA was an ABC affiliate it would play the famous Gannett ID and sounder before almost all newscasts. They now play the Gannett ID and Sounder only after the 6 PM weekday newscast, while other Gannett stations play the ID and Sounder hourly.

In April of 2004, KUSA became the first television station in the Denver market to produce newscasts in high definition, and the third such station nationally. Since then, a handfull of other Gannett stations are now producing newscasts in High Definition (HD or HDTV), including: KARE in Minneapolis - St. Paul, MN (debuted in April of 2006), KSDK in St. Louis, MO, KPNX in Phoenix, AZ, WKYC in Cleveland, OH, WUSA in Washington D.C., WXIA in Atlanta, GA, and KXTV in Sacramento, CA (KXTV currently produces Sacramento Kings NBA games, Friday Night Football highlights, and "California Postcard" reports in HD. There has been no official word yet on when KXTV's newscasts will convert to full HD.) All are NBC affiliates, except WUSA, which is a CBS affiliate, and KXTV, which is with ABC. Other Gannett owned and operated television stations with news departments are expected to follow suit.

In April of 2005, KUSA started broadcasting NBC Weather Plus on its DT2 digital subchannel and Comcast digital cable channel 249. Weather Plus can also be viewed on KUSA's website.

[edit] News Operations

KUSA's newscasts, which are known as "9 NEWS", has been very competitive with its rival stations since February of 1976, when Ed Sardella and John Rayburn anchored the weekday 10 PM newscast to the top of the ratings. Rayburn was later succeeded by Mike Landess in 1977, who would remain paired with Sardella as one of Denver's top anchor teams for 16 years until leaving for KUSA's sister station WXIA-TV in Atlanta in late 1993. Sardella retired from the anchor desk in 2000, but returned briefly to replace Jim Benemann, who had returned to KCNC-TV. Landess, after anchoring at WTTG in Washington D.C., returned to Denver on rival KMGH-TV.

On September 5, 2006, KUSA launched a daily half-hour 9 PM newscast on sister station KTVD, to coincide with that station's affiliation switch from UPN to MyNetworkTV. On December 5, 2006, KUSA launched a 2 hour extention of its weekday morning newscast on KTVD. KUSA now produces weekend morning newscasts at 6 AM on KTVD. Since June of 2005, in addition to its main studios on Downtown Denver, KUSA has been operating a "Northern Newsrooom" out of the offices of Fort Collins based Fort Collins Coloradoan newspaper. The newsroom is staffed by photo journalist Gary Wolfe. The station also operates a "Mountain Newsroom" in Frisco. KUSA has the distinction of being one of two stations in the U.S. that requires anchors and reporters to wear a label pin with the "9" logo on it. The other station to do this is KABC in Los Angeles, CA in which anchors wear a lable pin with the Circle 7 logo. The station's radar is called "HD Doppler 9".

[edit] Newscasts

Weekdays

9 NEWS Daybreak (5-6 AM)
9 NEWS 6 AM (6-7 AM)
9 NEWS Morning's at 7 AM on My 20 (7-8 AM on KTVD)
9 NEWS Morning's at 8 AM on My 20 (8-9 AM on KTVD)
9 NEWS at Noon (12-12:30 PM)
4 O'Clock at 9 NEWS (4-5 PM)
9 NEWS at 5 PM (5-5:30 PM)
9 NEWS at 6 PM (6-6:30 PM)
9 NEWS at 9 PM on My 20 (9-9:30 PM on KTVD)
9 NEWS at 10 PM (10-10:35 PM)

Saturday

9 NEWS Saturday Morning on My 20 (6-7 AM on KTVD)
9 NEWS Saturday Morning (7-9 AM)
9 NEWS at 5 PM (5-6 PM)
9 NEWS at 9 PM on My 20 (9-9:30 PM on KTVD)
9 NEWS at 10 PM (10-10:35 PM)

Sundays

9 NEWS Sunday Morning on My 20 (6-7 AM on KTVD)
9 NEWS Sunday Morning (7-9 AM)
9 MEWS at 5 PM on My 20 (5-6 PM on KTVD)
9 NEWS at 9 PM on My 20 (9-9:30 PM on KTVD)
9 NEWS at 10 PM (10-10:35 PM)
Overtime (10:35-11:05 PM) (weekly sports replay)

[edit] News Team

Anchors

Gary Shapiro - weekday mornings and Noon
Kyle Dyer - weekday mornings and Noon
Mark Koebrich - 4 PM weekdays, 9 PM on KTVD weekdays, reporter
Kim Christiansen - 4 PM weekdays, reporter
Bob Kendrick - 5 PM, 6 PM, and 10 PM weekdays
Adele Arakawa - 5 PM, 6 PM, and 10 PM weekdays
Shawn Patrick - weekend mornings, reporter
Cheryl Preheim - weekend mornings, reporter
Ward Lucas - weekend evenings, investigative reporter
Bazi Kanani - weekend evenings, 9 PM on KTVD weekdays and weekends, reporter

Meteorologists

Kathy Sabine - chief forecaster. (Not a Meterologist) seen weekday evenings (provides daily weather forcasts on KOA-AM 850, KHOW AM 630, the Denver Post, and the Fort Collins Coloradoan)
Nick O'Kelly - weekday mornings and Noon
Nick Carter - weekdays at Noon and weekend mornings
Marty Coniglio - weekend evenings
Ashton Aliteri- NBC Weather Plus Meterologist

Sports

Drew Soicher - weekday evenings
Susie Wargin - weekday mornings
Rod Mackey - weekend evenings
Brian Joist- sports reporter

Reporters

Anastasiya Bolton
Lorie Hirose
Carrie McClure
Quynh Nguyen
Chris Vanderveen
Deborah Sherman - investigative reporter
Paula Woodward - investigative reporter
Dr. Steph Clements - medical reporter
Taunia Hottman - weekday morning traffic reporter
Ginger Delgado - fill in anchor
Kirk Montgomery - 4 PM weekday entertainment reporter, fill in anchor
Matt Renoux - Mountain Newsroom reporter
Nelson Garcia - education / technology reporter
Gregg Moss - weekday morning buisness reporter
Adam Schrager - legislative reporter

Photo Journalists

Brett Alles
Matt Arnold
Don Brookins
Tom Cole
Dave Delozier
Dennis Dolan
Anne Herbst
Eric Kehe
John Kuhrt
Anna Mitchell
Ken Mostek
Brian Olson
Byron Reed
Corky Scholl
Manny Sotelo
Dan Weaver
Brian Willie
Gary Wolfe
Dan Wood
Scott Wright

[edit] Former Personalities

Bill Kuster - weather (1979-96, deceased)
Mike Landess - anchor (1977-93, now with KMGH)
Bertha Lynn - reporter (1976-81, now with KMGH)
Jayson Luber - traffic reporter (now with KMGH)
Mike Nelson - meteorologist (1991-2004, now with KMGH)
Ed Sardella - anchor (1974-2004, now retired)
Ron Zappolo - sports anchor (1990-2000, now a news anchor with KDVR)
Chip Yost - Investivative Reporter (2004-2005, now with KNBC and NBC's NEWS CHANNEL)
Leanne Gregg - reporter (1996-2000, now with NBC's NEWS CHANNEL)
Tom Costello - reporter, (earlt 1990s, now with NBC News as a correspondent for NBC Nightly News and MSNBC)
Roger Wolfe- reporter northern newsroom. (Retired June 2006)

[edit] External Links

Broadcast television in the Denver market (Nielsen DMA #18)
KWGN 2 (The CW) - KCNC 4 (CBS) - KRMA 6 (PBS/RMPBS) - KMGH 7 (ABC) - KUSA 9 (NBC) - KBDI 12 (PBS) - KTVD 20 / KUPN 3 (MNTV) - KDEN 25 (TMD) - KDVR 31 / KFCT 22 (Fox) - KDVT-LP 36 (TFU) - KDEV-LP 39 (RTN) - KRMT 41 (DS) - KCEC 50 (UNI) - KWHD 53 (LeSEA) - KPXC 59 (i)
Outlying Areas: KTNE 13 / KRNE 12 (PBS/NET) - K36DB 36 (RSN) - K45IE 45 (RSN)
Local cable television channels
Altitude - FSN Rocky Mountain