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WLOS, virtual and VHF digital channel 13, is an ABC-affiliated television station located in Asheville, North Carolina, United States. The station is owned by the Sinclair Broadcast Group; Sinclair also operates MyNetworkTV affiliate WMYA-TV (channel 40) under a local marketing agreement with owner Cunningham Broadcasting. The two stations share studio facilities located on Technology Drive (near I-26/US 74) in Asheville, WLOS maintains transmitter facilities located on Mount Pisgah in Haywood County, North Carolina. On cable, the station is available on Charter Communications channels 3 (in North Carolina) and 13 (in South Carolina), and in high definition on Charter digital channels 703 (in North Carolina) and 713 (in South Carolina). ==History== The station first signed on the air on September 18, 1954; broadcasting at 316,000 watts, it was founded by the Skyway Broadcasting Company, owners of WLOS radio (1380 AM, now WKJV; and 99.9 FM, now WKSF). Having been with the network since its sign-on, WLOS is the second-longest tenured primary ABC affiliate located south of Washington, D.C. (behind Lynchburg, Virginia's WSET-TV, also on channel 13 and also owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group). During the late-1950s, WLOS was also briefly affiliated with the NTA Film Network. The station's original studios and transmitter facilities were based alongside its radio sisters in West Asheville (the self-supporting tower with an analog batwing antenna atop it remains standing to this day). A few months after the station signed on, the television station relocated its operations 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, miles away. Due to the higher elevation, Federal Communications Commission rules required channel 13 to reduce its transmitter 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 large market. With its move to Mount Pisgah, WLOS could now boast the second highest transmitter location east of the Mississippi River at above average terrain (the valley floor) and above sea level. At the time, the highest transmitter elevation belonged to WMTW-TV atop Mount Washington, New Hampshire at above average terrain (the valley floor), and above sea level. The new tower location gave WLOS 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; 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 certain atmospheric conditions. Before the mid to late-1960s, no other full-time ABC affiliate put a clear signal into much of these areas. Before WKPT-TV signed on as the Tri-Cities' ABC affiliate, WLOS claimed the Tennessee-Virginia border area as part of its primary coverage area. Even after WKPT signed on, WLOS was available on cable in that market well into the 1980s and is still available in certain parts of it. 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 those stations were on UHF and did not get much signal penetration in their largely mountainous coverage areas. UHF stations, then as now, do not provide adequate reception in rugged terrain. Until the 1990s, WLOS relayed its programming on several separately-owned municipal translator stations in Eastern Kentucky. As mentioned above, WLOS now owns and operates ten analog translators that rebroadcast its digital signal. The station has also had significant and long-standing viewership in the Charlotte area, particularly in Hickory and points west. Its grade B signal can be seen as far east as Charlotte itself. 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''s 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 some cable systems in the western portion of the Charlotte market. WLOS' only competition for ABC programming came from WAIM-TV (channel 40, now WMYA) in Anderson, South Carolina, which also carried select CBS programs. WAIM had been the default ABC affiliate for the Upstate until WLOS' massive power boost. Unfortunately, WAIM-TV only provided a reliable signal to Anderson itself and nearby Pickens County. However, it still continued to air some ABC programming. Although WLOS was never seriously threatened by WAIM, it pressured ABC to drop its programming from WAIM from the 1960s onward finally succeeding in 1979. In 1958, Skyway Broadcasting merged with Wometco Enterprises of Miami, Florida (a movie theater company and former owner of the Blue Circle hamburger chain). Wometco promptly sold the AM station, but operated both the television and FM stations as Wometco-Skyway Broadcasting until 1984, when it was sold to investment firm Kohlberg Kravis Roberts. The FM station was also sold at this time and its antenna remained co-located on the Mount Pisgah tower. Channel 13 was later sold to Anchor Media in 1987, which in turn was later sold to River City Broadcasting in 1993. WLOS signed off on weeknights until the debut of ''World News Now'' in August 1992, when its sign-offs were scaled back to late Friday and Saturday overnights before being reduced further to Saturday mornings from 5:00 to 6:00 a.m., after the station's weekend overnight movie presentations, in the early 2000s. The channel began broadcasting a 24-hour daily schedule between late-2005 and early 2006 (the station still displays color bars for a few minutes in instances where the movie ends early, but otherwise fills overnight hours on Fridays and Saturdays with paid programming). River City merged with the Sinclair Broadcast Group in 1996. In 2000, the station moved its operations to new studio facilities on Technology Drive, about south of Downtown Asheville, which allowed station personnel to make a much shorter driving distance for sales calls and news team coverage to Greenville and Spartanburg, South Carolina. On January 5, 2007, cable provider Mediacom (which serves much of Western North Carolina, with the exception of Asheville itself) dropped all Sinclair-controlled stations, including WLOS and WMYA, from its systems due to a retransmission consent compensation dispute. As a result, much of WLOS' viewing area was left unable to view ABC programming until the dispute was resolved a month later. Additionally, Charter also briefly dropped WLOS's high definition feed due to a compensation dispute. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「WLOS」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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