KETK-TV
 | |
| Jacksonville/Tyler/Longview, Texas | |
|---|---|
| City of license | Jacksonville, Texas |
| Branding |
KETK NBC (general) KETK News (news) |
| Slogan | News You Won't See Anywhere Else |
| Channels |
Digital: 22 (UHF) Virtual: 56 (PSIP) |
| Affiliations |
56.1 NBC 56.2 Estrella TV |
| Owner |
Communications Corporation of America (sale to Nexstar Broadcasting Group pending) (Comcorp of Tyler License Corporation) |
| First air date | March 9, 1987 |
| Call letters' meaning | East Texas |
| Sister station(s) | KFXK-TV, KFXL-LD, KLPN-LP |
| Former channel number(s) |
Analog: 56 (UHF, 1987–2009) |
| Transmitter power | 1000 kW (digital) |
| Height | 458.8 m (digital) |
| Facility ID | 55643 |
| Transmitter coordinates | 32°3′40″N 95°18′50″W / 32.06111°N 95.31389°W |
| Website | www.ketknbc.com |
KETK-TV is the NBC-affiliated television station serving East Texas that is licensed to Jacksonville. It broadcasts a high-definition digital signal on UHF channel 22 (or virtual channel 56.1 via PSIP) from a transmitter in unincorporated northwestern Cherokee County, and it operates studios on Richmond Road (near Texas Loop 323) in Tyler. Owned by the Communications Corporation of America, KETK operates Fox affiliates KFXK-TV and KFXL-LD, and MyNetworkTV affiliate KLPN-LP through a local marketing agreement with White Knight Broadcasting. Its signal is relayed on low-powered KETK-LP (channel 53) in Nacogdoches (run by ComCorp through an operational agreement with KM Communications).
History
Originally, channel 56 was to have the call letters KTRG, the initials of the original owner and license applicant. Unfortunately, that owner had to file for bankruptcy prior to launching the station. The new buyers put channel 56 on the air with the new call letters KETK, amid a few hurdles. The station started on March 9, 1987, from studios in Jacksonville, Texas, with its tower near Mt. Selman (between Jacksonville and Tyler). KETK moved to its current building in Tyler in 1993.
At one point, KETK was owned by the Sinclair Broadcast Group, who acquired the station as part of its purchase of most of the Max Media Properties station group in 1998. In early 1999, Sinclair sold the non-license assets of the station to its current owner, ComCorp.[1] Sinclair continued to hold the license of KETK (with ComCorp operating the station via a time brokerage agreement) until 2004 when ComCorp acquired the station outright.
In June 2006, KETK owner ComCorp filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. Rival CBS affiliate KYTX (channel 19) sparked controversy by publicly announcing the ComCorp bankruptcy on its newscasts, for an entire week. ComCorp said in a press release viewers and staff would see no changes at the station. The company emerged from bankruptcy in late 2007.
On April 24, 2013, ComCorp announced the sale of its entire group (including KETK) to the Nexstar Broadcasting Group. KFXK and KLPN will be sold to Mission Broadcasting. Nexstar will continue to operate KFXK and KLPN under a shared service agreement, with sister station KETK.[2]
Appearance in Brüno
In deleted scenes from the 2009 film Brüno, the title character (played by Sacha Baron Cohen) visits the KETK studios and meets with news director Neal Barton and sports director Danny Elzner. They signed releases and expected to be talking about small-town news in the United States. Instead, the interviews conducted by the flamboyant Brüno character drifted towards the topic of homosexuality. The scene culminated with an interview Brüno did with a local white supremacist who threatened to call the police on him when his behavior became too overtly homosexual.
Digital television
| Channel | Video | Aspect | PSIP short name | Programming |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 56.1 | 1080i | 16:9 | KETK-DT | Main KETK-TV programming / NBC |
| 56.2 | 480i | 4:3 | KETK-ME | Me-TV |
KETK-TV began operating a full power digital television signal on UHF channel 22 on June 17, 2006. The station began testing high definition broadcasts of NBC programming on September 1 of that year, and started airing NBC programming in 1080i HD full-time four days later on September 5. Three days after that on September 8, 2006, KETK launched a second digital subchannel carrying NBC Weather Plus; the national Weather Plus feed was shut down on December 1, 2008. A month later on January 1, 2009, KETK replaced a local feed of Weather Plus with Me-TV.
During the analog television era, the station's UHF channel 56 signal had the designation of having the highest channel allocation of any NBC affiliate. This ended after the high-band UHF channels (52-69) were removed from broadcast use during the digital television transition in the United States on June 12, 2009. There was speculation that between the original DTV transition deadline on February 17, 2009 and the new federally set deadline on June 12, 2009 that KETK would change its on-air station branding to reflect its physical digital channel 22. However, KETK continues to use its former analog channel allocation as its virtual channel through the use of PSIP.
The station originally planned to shut down its analog signal on June 12, 2009. However, the analog transmitter failed during the early morning hours of March 27, 2009, due to a malfunction of the cooling system at the transmitter facilities. Because of the cost and time involved that it would have taken to repair the analog transmitter, KETK filed a Notice of Suspension of Operations with the FCC and permanently terminated its analog operations on UHF channel 56 effective March 27, 2009.
News operation
KETK broadcasts more news than any other station in the Tyler-Longview market. Newscasts are broadcast weekdays from 5-7 a.m., 11 a.m.-noon, and at 5, 6 and 10 p.m., as well as weekends from 8-9 a.m., and at 5 and 10 p.m. It also produces a popular Friday night sports show called Friday Football Fever, featuring East Texas football teams and sports director Danny Elzner.
The station promotes its weather team as having the "Most Powerful Radar in East Texas", referred to as "KETK Live Doppler Skywatch". Also, KETK is the only station in the area to have four college degreed meteorologists on its weather team, but that still does not help KETK in its ratings. From July 2008 to October 2009, KETK was the solid #2 news product in the East Texas market. KLTV leads the local news ratings by far, with over 70,000 households, while KYTX was a distant #3. However, since November 2009, KETK has been a distant #3 behind both KLTV and KYTX although KETK's ratings are expected to recover after NBC pulled The Jay Leno Show off of prime-time.
On April 23, 2010, KETK began producing its newscasts in high definition, becoming the second station in the Tyler-Longview television market (after KYTX) to do so.
KETK is one of only three ComCorp stations that produce their newscasts in-house (the others being fellow NBC affiliate KTSM in El Paso, Texas and WVLA in Baton Rouge, Louisiana). Due to insufficient funds for most ComCorp stations to produce their own newscasts, KETK serves as a hub for the news operations for most of ComCorp's television stations, it produces pre-recorded newscasts for most of its Fox affiliates including KFXK-TV in Longview, Texas, KWKT/KYLE in Waco and College Station, Texas, and KMSS in Shreveport, Louisiana. Previously, the station also provided pre-recorded newscasts for WGMB in Baton Rouge and weekday evening newscasts for WVLA also in Baton Rouge (it produced in-studio news segments for WVLA's evening newscasts from 2009 to 2010, when that station began began producing its evening newscasts locally once again following the Deepwater Horizon oil spill). Weekend newscasts for WVLA in Baton Rouge are still pre-recorded at the KETK station.
News/station presentation
Newscast titles
- TV-56 News (1987–1988)
- Region 56 News (1988–1999)
- NBC 56 News (2000–2005)
- KETK 56 News (2005–2008)
- KETK News (2008–present)
- KETK Today (morning newscast)
- East Texas Live (11 a.m. newscast)
- Live at 5 (5 p.m. newscast)
Station slogans
- "The Most Complete Newscast in East Texas" (1988–1992)
- "The Most Watched" (1992–1994)
- "Where Local News Comes First" (1994–2000)
- "Covering All of East Texas" (2001–2005)
- "The News Station" (2005–2010)
- "News You Won't See Anywhere Else" (2010–2011)
This film, television or video-related list is incomplete; you can help by expanding it with reliably sourced additions.On-air staff
Current on-air staff[3]
Anchors
- Neal Barton - weeknights at 5 and 6 p.m.
- Bob Brackeen - weekday mornings KETK Today (5-7 a.m.) and East Texas Live (11 a.m.-12 p.m.)
- Ben Hill - weekday mornings (7-9 a.m.) on KFXK; also reporter
- Kaci Koviak - weeknights at 6 and 10 p.m.
- Nicole Vowell - weekends at 5 and 10 p.m., also weeknight reporter
- Kaci Koviak - weekday mornings KETK Today (5-7 a.m.) and East Texas Live (11 a.m.-12 p.m.)
- Teresa Sardina - weekend mornings at 8 a.m., also weeknight reporter
KETK Live Doppler SkyWatch Weather
- Scott Chesner - chief meteorologist; weeknights at 5, 6 and 10 p.m.
- Katie Green (AMS Certified Broadcast Meteorologist Seal of Approval) - meteorologist; weekday mornings KETK Today and East Texas Live (11 a.m.-12 p.m.)
- Kyle Roberts - meteorologist; weekend mornings, and weekend evenings at 5 and 10 p.m.
Sports team
- Danny Elzner - sports director; weeknights at 6 and 10 p.m.
- Phil Kuchinsky - sports anchor; weekends at 5 and 10 p.m., also sports reporter
Reporters
- Roger Gray - general assignment reporter, also fill-in anchor
- Rachel Hackbarth - general assignment reporter
- Garrett Sanders - general assignment reporter
- Marlena Hamilton - general assignment reporter
- Alexa Vogue - general assignment reporter
Notable former staff
- Richelle Carey (now at HLN)[4]
- Jonna Fitzgerald (currently in politics)
- Jennifer Kielman (Former 6 & 10pm Anchor)
See also
References
External links
- KETKNBC.com - Official Website
- Query the FCC's TV station database for KETK-TV
- BIAfn's Media Web Database -- Information on KETK-TV
- Notification of Suspension of Operations/Request for Silent STA
| ||||||||||||||
| ||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||