WECT
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| WECT | |
|---|---|
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| Wilmington, North Carolina | |
| Branding | WECT TV 6 WECT News |
| Slogan | Where News Comes First |
| Channels | Analog: 6 (VHF) |
| Affiliations | NBC |
| Owner | Raycom Media (WECT License Subsidiary, LLC) |
| Founded | April 9, 1954 |
| Call letters’ meaning | Eastern Carolina Television |
| Sister station(s) | WSFX-TV |
| Former callsigns | WMFD-TV (1954-1958) |
| Former affiliations | All secondary: DuMont (1954-1956) ABC (1954-1964) CBS (1954-1980s) |
| Transmitter Power | 100 kW (analog) 575 kW (digital) |
| Height | 588 m (analog) 280 m (digital) |
| Facility ID | 48666 |
| Transmitter Coordinates | (analog) (digital) |
| Website | www.wect.com |
WECT, channel 6, is an NBC-affiliated television station in Wilmington, North Carolina. WECT is owned by Raycom Media, and is one-half of a duopoly with Fox affiliate WSFX-TV (channel 26). The two stations share studios and offices in downtown Wilmington, and WECT has transmitters located in Elizabethtown (analog) and Delco, North Carolina (digital).
WECT is one of five Wilmington commercial television stations that agreed to end analog transmissions early and will become a digital-only station on September 8, 2008, a move which will make Wilmington the first all-digital television market in the United States. [1]
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[edit] History
The first television station in Wilmington, channel 6 began broadcasting on April 9, 1954 as WMFD-TV, co-owned with WMFD radio (630 AM). In 1958, the station's calls changed to the current WECT. At its launch, channel 6 carried secondary affiliations with the DuMont Television Network, which went silent in 1956, and ABC until 1964 (at which point ABC moved to its own Wilmington affiliate, WWAY). WECT was also a secondary CBS station until the 1970s, primarily carrying that network's Sunday afternoon National Football League coverage.
WECT usually airs the entire NBC schedule except for NBC's late night repeats of The Tonight Show with Jay Leno and Late Night with Conan O'Brien. Instead, the station airs Shop at Home during those hours. The station also produces an outdoor-type program called Downeast Gardener that airs in segments during the morning news on Wednesdays as well as a full program on Saturday mornings at 7:30.
The station's analog signal audio can be heard on 87.7 FM in most areas the video signal can be received (and some that it cannot). This is because of the electromagnetic field effect which puts the audio signal of channel 6 at the location of 87.75 MHz with tuners getting the signal at 87.7 FM. This is true for all channel 6 television stations in the United States.
The station currently serves as the default NBC affiliate for the northern and eastern portions of the nearby Florence-Myrtle Beach television market since that area does not have an affiliate of its own. However, WECT's reception in the northern parts of that market (such as Laurinburg) is not as good as other stations. This will change in 2008 when new station WMBF-TV, also owned by Raycom Media, begins broadcasting. The southern and western portions of the Florence-Myrtle Beach market are served by another Raycom station, WIS-TV in Columbia.
At one point, WECT was carried on cable systems in the Triangle region of North Carolina (Raleigh, Durham, Fayetteville, and Chapel Hill) for a time when NBC did not have a fulltime affiliate in that market. As a result of the station's long-held popularity, WECT is still carried on cable systems in Fayetteville and Jacksonville even though their respective markets have their own NBC affiliates.
[edit] Digital television
The station's digital signal is multiplexed.
| Subchannel | Programming |
|---|---|
| 6.1 / 44.1 | main WECT/NBC programming |
| 6.2 / 44.2 | NBC Weather Plus |
[edit] Analog-to-digital conversion
On May 8, 2008, the Federal Communications Commission announced that five stations in Wilmington, including WECT, had agreed to voluntarily cease analog broadcasting on September 8, 2008, [2] five months ahead of the February 17, 2009, tentative date for television stations to complete the analog-to-digital transition. [3] When in effect, the Wilmington market will be the first in the United States to convert to all-digital, and will be used by the FCC as a post-transition test market.
WECT will broadcast from its current pre-transition channel number, 44. [4] However, through the use of PSIP, digital television receivers will display WECT's virtual channel as 6.
[edit] News operation
Since September 22, 2003, WECT has been producing a nightly 10 o'clock news for sister station WSFX-TV. On September 13, 2006, WECT began to produce an hour-long extension of its weekday morning news at 7 A.M. on that station. All WSFX newscasts broadcast from a secondary news set at WECT's studios.
[edit] Current personalities
- Anchors
- Jon Evans - weeknights 11:00 p.m.
- Jim Hanchett - weeknights 5:00 (5:20 to 5:40) and 6:00 p.m.
- Joe Keiley - Saturdays (also reporter)
- Kim Lehman - weeknights 5:00 p.m. (5:40 to 6:00)
- Kim Ratcliff - weekday mornings and Noon
- Bob Townsend - weekday mornings/co-host of Downeast Gardener
- Sarah Warlick - Sundays (also reporter)
- Frances Weller - weeknights at 5:00 (5:00 to 5:20), 6:00, and 11:00 p.m.
- Weather
- Craig Carnesi - weeknights
- Eric Davis - weekday mornings and Noon
- George Elliott - weekends
Sports
- Bob Bonner - sports director/weeknight anchor
- Kevin Hull - weekend anchor/reporter
Reporters
- Kelli O'Hara
- Heather Setzler (arts and entertainment)
- Max Winitz
[edit] Notable alumni
- Genevieve Barker
- Shirley Gilbert
- Jeff Goldblatt
- Ken Murphy ([1])
- Maureen O’Boyle
[edit] Logos
 WECT logo used from May 8, 1986 until 1995. |
 WECT logo used from 1995 until 2005. |
 Current WECT logo used since 2005. It is similar to the previous logo but enhanced for network HD. |
[edit] External links
[edit] References
- ^ http://www.wect.com/Global/story.asp?S=8292071&nav=menu157_2
- ^ http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/DOC-282032A1.pdf
- ^ http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/DA-06-1082A2.pdf
- ^ http://fjallfoss.fcc.gov/cgi-bin/ws.exe/prod/cdbs/forms/prod/cdbsmenu.hts?context=25&appn=101233271&formid=387&fac_num=48666
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