KATN
File:KATN2.png |
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| Fairbanks, Alaska United States |
|
|---|---|
| City of license | Fairbanks |
| Branding | KATN ABC 2 (general) Your Alaska Link (newscasts) |
| Slogan | Alaska's Superstation Your Alaska Link |
| Channels | Digital: 18 (UHF) Virtual: 2 (PSIP) |
| Affiliations | ABC (secondary until 1985) The CW (DT2) |
| Owner | Vision Alaska LLC (Vision Alaska II LLC) |
| First air date | March 1, 1955 |
| Call letters' meaning | Alaska Television Network |
| Sister station(s) | KJUD, KTBY, KYUR |
| Former callsigns | KFAR-TV (1955-1981)[1] KTTU-TV (1981-1984) |
| Former channel number(s) | Analog: 2 (VHF, 1955-2009) |
| Former affiliations | NBC (1955-1996, secondary from 1985) The WB (DT2) (1995-2006) |
| Transmitter power | 16 kW |
| Height | 230 m |
| Facility ID | 13813 |
| Transmitter coordinates | Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. |
| Website | www.youralaskalink.com |
KATN, virtual channel 2 (digital channel 18), is the ABC-affiliated television station in Fairbanks, Alaska. The station is owned by Vision Alaska LLC. Its studios are located in the Lathrop Building on 2nd Avenue in downtown Fairbanks and the transmitter tower is northeast of the city on Cranberry Ridge.
Digital television
| Channel | Video | Aspect | PSIP short name | Programming |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2.1 | 720p | 16:9 | KATN-HD | Main KATN programming / ABC |
| 2.2 | 480i | 4:3 | KATN CW | The CW |
History
KATN debuted on March 1, 1955 as KFAR-TV, and was Fairbanks' second television station after KTVF. It became KTTU-TV (no relation to the Tucson, Arizona station) in 1981 and KATN in 1984. It is now a part of the ABC Alaska Superstation and was the first TV station in Fairbanks to broadcast in color in 1967 (while KTVF was temporarily off the air due to a flood).
KFAR/KTTU was primarily an NBC station with ABC as the secondary network until 1984, when the owners of KIMO (now KYUR) bought the station, changed the call letters (the ATN in KATN stood for Alaska Television Network, a consortium of KATN, KIMO, and KJUD), and made them the primary ABC affiliate. KATN would continue to carry NBC programs as a secondary affiliate until 1996 when KTVF flipped from CBS to NBC in response to KATN's new ownership. Until the launch of KFXF in 1992, they were Fairbanks' only two commercial network stations.
In September 2006, KATN began to show programming from The CW Television Network on its digital subchannel. The subchannel is called Fairbanks CW and uses the fictional call letters KWFA-DT (the actual call letters of the subchannel are still KATN).
Smith Media sold KATN and the remainder of the "ABC Alaska's Superstation" system to Vision Alaska LLC in 2010.[2]
