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| Kingston, Ontario | |
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| Branding | CKWS Television |
| Channels | Analog: 11 (VHF) |
| Translators | see below |
| Affiliations | CBC |
| Owner | Corus Entertainment, Inc. (591989 B.C. Ltd.) |
| First air date | December 18, 1954 |
| Call letters' meaning | Kingston Whig-Standard |
| Sister station(s) | CHEX-TV CFMK-FM CKWS-FM |
| Transmitter power | 325 kW |
| Height | 311.9 m |
| Transmitter coordinates | 44°9′59″N 76°25′28″W / 44.16639°N 76.42444°W |
| Website | CKWS Television |
CKWS-TV is a privately owned television station serving as an affiliate of CBC Television in Kingston, Ontario, Canada. It broadcasts an analogue signal on VHF channel 11 from a transmitter near Highway 95 in Wolfe Island, south of Kingston and operates UHF rebroadcasters in Brighton on channel 66, Spencerville on channel 26 and Beckwith Township (Smiths Falls/Perth) on channel 36.
Owned by Corus Entertainment, its studios are located at 170 Queen Street in downtown Kingston. This station can also be seen on Cogeco Cable channel 10 and digital channel 910. There is a high definition feed, which only carries CBC network programming in the format, offered on Cogeco digital channel 702.
Its signal covers portions of Eastern Ontario from Campbellford to Morrisburg and from Perth to Oswego, New York in the United States, and is available on many cable systems throughout Eastern Ontario, and Northern and Central New York.
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History [edit]
CKWS has been a CBC affiliate since its inception in late 1954. It was originally a joint venture between Roy Thomson and the Davies family, owners of the Kingston Whig-Standard (the source of its calls). The station has been sold three times: to the Kanatec Corporation, bought by Power Corporation in 1977 and to Corus in 1999.
Many children across the country were exposed to CKWS programming in the late 1970s and 1980s by the Harrigan series - a particularly innocent and low budget show about a leprechaun, starring Barry Dale.[1] Shelagh Rogers of CBC Radio fame started out presenting the weather for the station's newscasts.
Until the arrival of CJOH-TV's Deseronto repeater on channel 6 in 1972 and cable television in Kingston in 1973, CKWS had very much a captive audience, as the only other station reliably available over-the-air was Watertown, New York's WWNY-TV.
Although the station is a private affiliate, it airs the minimum amount of CBC programming (40 hours per week).
On-air staff [edit]
Current on-air staff[2] [edit]
Anchors
- Julie Brown - weeknights at 6 p.m.
- Bill Hutchins - weeknights at 6 p.m.
- Bill Hall - weather anchor; weeknights at 5:30, 6 and 11 p.m., also host of Newswatch Live @ 5
- Doug Jeffries - sports anchor; weeknights at 6 and 11 p.m.
- Bill Welychka - host of Newswatch Live @ 5; also producer
- Melissa Duggan - weeknights at 5:30 and 11 p.m.
Videographers
- Heather Butts
- Braden Dragomir
- Erin Howe
- Maegen Kulchar
- Paul Soucy
- Stephanie Wilkins
- Mike Postovit - sports videographer
Transmitters [edit]
| Station | City of licence | Channel | ERP | HAAT | Transmitter Coordinates |
| CKWS-DT-1 | Brighton | 30 (UHF) Virtual: 66.1 (PSIP) |
0.938 kW | 158.6 m | 44°2′40″N 77°47′35″W / 44.04444°N 77.79306°W |
| CKWS-TV-2 | Prescott | 26 (UHF) | 7.2 kW | 118.2 m | 44°49′55″N 75°31′16″W / 44.83194°N 75.52111°W |
| CKWS-TV-3 | Smiths Falls | 36 (UHF) | 10 kW | 100 m | 45°0′42″N 76°3′16″W / 45.01167°N 76.05444°W |
Although CKWS-TV's Smiths Falls repeater overlaps its signal with that of CBC owned-and-operated station CBOT Ottawa, CKWS-TV-3 usually serves the Brockville area, along with the station's Prescott rebroadcaster.[3]
Digital television [edit]
As of September 2011, no Canadian terrestrial station serving Kingston has applied for a digital transitional television license. Kingston was not one of the 31 markets in which the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) imposed a mandatory analogue shutdown on August 31, 2011.[4]
In January 2013, CKWS applied to the CRTC to convert its Kingston transmitter to digital.[5] The station has not announced plans to convert to digital its transmitters in Prescott and Smiths Falls. CKWS has converted its Brighton translator CKWS-TV-1 to digital channel 30 on August 31, 2011 due to the fact that its current analog UHF channel 66 falls in the band that will be reallocated; however, the digital signal will not be broadcast in HD until CKWS installs the appropriate equipment in their studios.[6]
CKWS is available digitally as part of the Bell TV and Shaw Direct satellite pay-TV packages.
The CKWS transmitter at Wolfe Island/Kingston was supposed to flash cut to digital on Thursday April 25 2013. However, a backlog of such approvals at the CRTC has delayed the switch. The channel broadcast on VHF channel 11 will remap to virtual channel 11.1 once they go digital. [7]
See also [edit]
References [edit]
External links [edit]
- CKWS Television
- Canadian Communications Foundation - CKWS-TV History
- Fybush tower site descriptions - September 5, 2008 - Kingston, Ontario
- Query the REC's Canadian station database for CKWS-TV
- Query TV Fool's coverage map for CKWS
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