Branding GPB Channels Digital: 8 (VHF) | Slogan Bringing You the Best | |
 | ||
Subchannels 25.1 - GPB/PBS HD (1080i)
25.2 - GPB Create TV (480i)
25.3 - GPB Knowledge (480i) Owner Georgia Public Broadcasting
(The Georgia Public Telecommunications Commission) First air date March 6, 1967; 50 years ago (1967-03-06) | ||
WACS-TV "PBS GPB-TV UHF 25 Analog (Digital VHF 8)" part of the GPB network, is Georgia's ninth public television station and primarily serves the southern part of the Columbus market including Dawson and Americus. WACS' transmitter is located north of Parrott, Georgia. The station's signal travels in about a 40-mile (64-km) radius from the transmitter site and also reaches parts of southeastern Alabama.
Contents
WACS is one of GPB's most powerful stations, providing at least grade B coverage from Columbus to Albany. Although Columbus' GPB station of record is WJSP-TV, over-the-air viewers in most of the city get a much stronger signal from WACS. WJSP's transmitter in Warm Springs provides marginal coverage at best to most of Columbus itself, even though it is 45 minutes north of Columbus. By comparison, WACS' transmitter is almost an hour south. WACS also provides a strong signal to much of Albany though that city's GPB station of record is Pelham's WABW-TV, channel 14. All are satellites of Athens/Atlanta's WGTV, the network's flagship station. They simulcast an identical broadcast schedule with no local content.
WACS-TV Channel 25 signed on the air on Monday March 6, 1967 and being the 8th Television Station in The U.S. State of Georgia and the city of license is Dawson and connected to Americus & Cordele and within 2 Months after both sisters WABW-TV (Channel 14) & WCLP(-TV) (Channel 18) signed on in January 1967 are all 3 including WACS-TV 25 affiliated to The National Educational Television (NET) Network and on Monday October 5, 1970 NET became PBS through 2009. It's digital signal is permanently on channel 8 with roughly the same coverage.
Digital programming
WACS-TV broadcasts the following digital subchannels:
Tower destruction
In March 2007, the station's broadcast tower was destroyed by one of several tornadoes which struck the region during a major outbreak on March 1. The same tornado, rated an EF3, went on to cause serious destruction in Americus. [1] Cable TV viewers continued to receive GPB directly from satellite, or over-the-air via neighboring GPB stations WJSP or WABW, while GPB worked to replace the tower and the transmitter building it partly fell on. This was finally completed in early May 2008, although to avoid losing the station's license (due to a one-year statutory requirement for all off-air stations enacted by Congress, and therefore not correctable by the Federal Communications Commission), GPB engineers borrowed the transmitter from W22AC in Hartwell to get WACS back on the air before the end of February.