KQUP

KQUP (channel 24) is a television station in Pullman, Washington, United States, which is currently silent. It is owned by the Word of God Fellowship, the parent company of the Daystar Television Network, and serves the Spokane television market. Its main transmitter is located atop Tekoa Mountain. A low-power television station, KQUP-LD (channel 47), serves as a supplement to KQUP for coverage of Spokane and Coeur d'Alene, Idaho.

KQUP
Currently silent
Channels
Ownership
Owner
History
First air date
April 19, 2004 (2004-04-19)[lower-alpha 1]
Former channel number(s)
Analog: 24 (UHF, 2004–2009)
Call sign meaning
Station was originally an affiliate of UPN
Technical information[1]
Licensing authority
FCC
Facility ID78921
ERP57 kW
HAAT419 m (1,375 ft)
Transmitter coordinates47°15′29.6″N 117°5′27.6″W
Translator(s)KQUP-LD 47 (14 UHF) Spokane
Links
Public license information

Equity Media Holdings built KQUP in 2004 after significant delays. By way of the Spokane translator and cable, in 2002, it replaced KSKN as the UPN affiliate in Spokane until switching to the Retro Television Network at the start of 2006. Equity entered bankruptcy reorganization in 2008; the station lost RTN programming in 2009 as the result of a contract dispute with the network and was then sold at auction to Daystar.

History

A construction permit for channel 24, originally assigned the call sign KBGC, was awarded in 1998, but it was not for five and a half years that the station began broadcasting as intended. The construction of KQUP was fraught with difficulties. Equity had hoped to start broadcasting at full power by September 1, but by that time, only K47EJ, a translator in Coeur d'Alene (the present KQUP-LD), was ready.[2] Consequently, the vast majority of cable and broadcast viewers lost UPN programming. Doug Krile, Equity's corporate public relations director, told the Lewiston Morning Tribune in late September, "This was not the timetable everything was supposed to be operating on."[3] Equipment delays, including the shipping of a transmitter from Italy to the United States, and lease negotiations with Washington State University for use of a tower held up completion of the facility.[3] As an interim solution, KSKN contracted with UPN to air Buffy the Vampire Slayer and WWE SmackDown from January 2003 through the end of the television season.[4] KQUP was added to the main Comcast cable system in Spokane on May 1, 2003,[5] but the Pullman transmitter was relocated to another site and was not activated until April 19, 2004.[6]

KQUP dropped UPN for Retro TV on January 1, 2006; Rod Hall, the general manager, told The Spokesman-Review, "In the long term, we just felt that UPN's shows were not ideally suited for the Spokane market."[7] The station also aired Spokane Shock arena football.[8]

On January 4, 2009, a contract conflict between Equity—which had filed the month before for Chapter 11 bankruptcy—and RTN—which had been sold to Luken Communications in 2008—interrupted the programming on many RTN affiliates.[9] As a result, Luken restored a national RTN feed from its headquarters in Chattanooga, Tennessee, with individual customized feeds to non-Equity-owned affiliates to follow on a piecemeal basis. KQUP lost its RTN affiliation immediately; the network never found a new home in the market.[10]

At auction on April 16, 2009, Daystar bought KQUP.[11] KQUP-LP began airing Daystar programming that August, but the full-power KQUP digital signal did not sign on until January 2010.

As of August 2022, the station no longer broadcasts any programming.[12]

Digital television

Because it was granted an original construction permit after the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) finalized the DTV allotment plan on April 21, 1997,[13] the station did not receive a companion channel for a digital television station. Instead, at the end of the digital TV conversion period for full-service stations, KQUP would have been required to turn off its analog signal and turn on its digital signal (called a "flash-cut"). Equity owned a significant number of such stations, and its financial condition meant that it owned a significant number of stations that needed digital conversion; the company warned the FCC that court approval and financing would be required to finance this conversion.[14] The station shut down analog broadcasting from Pullman on June 12, 2009.

Notes
  1. KQUP-LD, as K47EJ, began broadcasting UPN programming in September 2002.

References
  1. "Facility Technical Data for KQUP". Licensing and Management System. Federal Communications Commission.
  2. Kershner, Jim (September 1, 2002). "Viewers will miss UPN premieres". The Spokesman-Review. Spokane, Washington. p. F3. Retrieved November 20, 2022 – via Newspapers.com.
  3. McGehee, Maggie (September 26, 2002). "Valley, Palouse cable subscribers lose UPN". Lewiston Morning Tribune. p. 5A.
  4. "'Buffy,' 'WWE' airing on KSKN-22 Saturday". The Spokesman-Review. January 31, 2003. p. D4. Retrieved November 20, 2022 – via Newspapers.com.
  5. Kershner, Jim (April 6, 2003). "Buzzard has landed in Spokane". The Spokesman-Review. Spokane, Washington. p. F3, F8. Retrieved November 20, 2022 – via Newspapers.com.
  6. Raquet, Murf (April 17, 2004). "BIZ BITS: Pullman's Sage Baking Co., closes; Belle Dolci opens". Moscow–Pullman Daily News.
  7. Kershner, Jim (January 15, 2006). "Spokane is missing its UPN affiliation". The Spokesman-Review. Spokane, Washington. p. D3, D6. Retrieved November 20, 2022 – via Newspapers.com.
  8. Meehan, Jim (March 23, 2006). "Shock lose in Blankenship sweepstakes: Stockton grabs former EWU QB". The Spokesman-Review. Spokane, Washington. p. C3. Retrieved November 20, 2022 – via Newspapers.com.
  9. "What's Wrong with MyTV?". WSAV. January 4, 2009. Archived from the original on January 13, 2009. Retrieved April 18, 2009.
  10. "Financial Dispute Disrupts RTN Diginet". TVNewsDay. January 5, 2009. Archived from the original on February 8, 2009. Retrieved August 23, 2022.
  11. "Equity Auctions Off 60 Stations for $21.3M". TVNewsCheck. Archived from the original on May 31, 2012. Retrieved April 18, 2009.
  12. "Digital TV Market Listing for KQUP". RabbitEars.info. Retrieved 23 August 2022.
  13. "Final DTV Channel Plan from FCC97-115".
  14. "FCC DTV status report".
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