Branding NBC Nebraska News 2 Affiliations NBC | Subchannels 2.1 NBC
2.2 Fox | |
Slogan Coverage You Can Count On Channels Digital: 2 (VHF)
Virtual: 2 (PSIP) Translators KNEP 4.2 Scottsbluff
K18DH Broken Bow | ||
KNOP-TV is the NBC affiliated television station in North Platte, Nebraska, United States. It is owned by Gray Television along with CBS affiliate KNPL-LD and Fox affiliate KIIT-CD. Both stations share studios and transmitter on U.S. 83 in North Platte. The station is also seen on rebroadcast translator K18DH in Broken Bow, which broadcasts an analog signal.
Contents
History
KNOP was founded by local investors headed by attorney Rush Clarke and went on-air December 15, 1958. In 1968, it was purchased by Dick Shively and Ulysses Carlini Sr. After purchasing Hastings, Nebraska station KHAS-TV in 1997, Shively and Carlini operated the stations (as well as K11TW, now KIIT-CD, which they founded in 1994) as Greater Nebraska Television. Shively died in 2003. In 2005, Greater Nebraska Television sold the stations to Hoak Media.
KNOP started rebroadcasting NBC programming in high-definition, and carrying K11TW's Fox programming on its .2 digital subchannel, in March 2011.
KNOP gained national attention in February 2012 for being the only station in the country to air a Will Ferrell-produced Super Bowl commercial for Old Milwaukee beer.
On November 20, 2013, Hoak announced the sale of most of its stations, including KNOP-TV and K11TW, to Gray Television. The sale made them sister stations to North Platte CBS affiliate KNPL-LD, a semi-satellite of Gray's KOLN/KGIN; it would have also partially separated KNOP from KHAS-TV, which was planned to be sold to Excalibur Broadcasting but be operated by Gray's KOLN/KGIN and KSNB-TV through a shared services agreement. However, in the wake of heightened FCC scrutiny about local marketing agreements, on June 11, 2014, KHAS-TV announced it would leave the air at midnight on June 13 and NBC programming would be moved to KSNB-TV and the digital subcarrier of KOLN/KGIN. The whole sale was completed on June 13. (KHAS was ultimately sold to Legacy Broadcasting, the call letters were changed to KNHL, and it returned to the air in June 2015 as a SonLife Broadcasting Network affiliate.)
On May 5, 2016, KNOP gained a semi-satellite station in KNEP, licensed to Sidney, Nebraska. KNEP is the former KDUH-TV, formerly a satellite of Rapid City, South Dakota-based KOTA-TV. Gray Television obtained KOTA and KDUH as part of its purchase of the broadcasting assets of Schurz Communications announced in September 2015. As part of the satellite switch, Gray sought and received FCC approval to move KDUH's city of license from Scottsbluff, Nebraska to Sidney to avoid regulatory conflict with KSTF-TV, a Gray-owned, Scottsbluff-based semi-satellite of Cheyenne, Wyoming-based KGWN-TV. Sidney is part of the Denver market. KNEP continues to rebroadcast ABC-affiliated KOTA on channel 4.1, while KNOP's NBC feed appears on channel 4.2, is branded as "NBC Nebraska Scottsbluff" and produces its own newscasts.
Digital channels
The station's digital signal is multiplexed:
Analog-to-digital conversion
KNOP-TV shut down its analog signal, over VHF channel 2, in early February 2009. The station's digital signal relocated from its pre-transition UHF channel 22 to VHF channel 2 for post-transition operations.