WOVA-LD (channel 22) is a low-power television station in

Parkersburg, West Virginia Parkersburg is a city in and the county seat of Wood County, West Virginia, Wood County, West Virginia. Located at the confluence of the Ohio River, Ohio and Little Kanawha River, Little Kanawha rivers, it is the state's fourth-largest city and ...

, United States, affiliated with

Fox Foxes are small to medium-sized, omnivorous mammals belonging to several genera of the family Canidae. They have a flattened skull, upright, triangular ears, a pointed, slightly upturned snout, and a long bushy tail (or ''brush''). Twelve sp ...

and

The CW Plus The CW Plus is a secondary national programming service feed of The CW that is fully controlled and 75% owned by Nexstar Media Group, with Paramount Global and Warner Bros. Discovery each owning a 12.5% stake in the network. It is intended primar ...

. It is owned by

Gray Television Gray Television, Inc. is an American publicly traded television broadcasting company based in Atlanta, Georgia. Founded in 1946 by James Harrison Gray as Gray Communications Systems, the company owns or operates 180 stations across the United St ...

alongside

NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an Television in the United States, American English-language Commercial broadcasting, commercial television network, broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Enterta ...

affiliate

WTAP-TV WTAP-TV (channel 15) is a television station in Parkersburg, West Virginia, United States, affiliated with NBC. It is owned by Gray Television alongside two low-power stations: Fox affiliate WOVA-LD (channel 22) and CBS affiliate WIYE-LD (c ...

(channel 15) and low-power

CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainmen ...

affiliate

WIYE-LD WIYE-LD (channel 26) is a low-power television station in Parkersburg, West Virginia, United States, affiliated with CBS and MyNetworkTV. It is owned by Gray Television alongside NBC affiliate WTAP-TV (channel 15) and low-power Fox affiliate WOVA ...

(channel 26). The three stations share studios on Market Street (official address is One Television Plaza) in downtown Parkersburg; WOVA-LD's transmitter is located in Independence Township, Ohio.

History

The

market Market is a term used to describe concepts such as: *Market (economics), system in which parties engage in transactions according to supply and demand *Market economy *Marketplace, a physical marketplace or public market Geography *Märket, an ...

's first-ever locally based Fox affiliate was originally seen on a second

digital subchannel In broadcasting, digital subchannels are a method of transmitting more than one independent program stream simultaneously from the same digital radio or television station on the same radio frequency channel. This is done by using data compress ...

of WTAP. Prior to that launch, the Parkersburg–

Marietta Marietta may refer to: Places in the United States *Marietta, Jacksonville, Florida *Marietta, Georgia, the largest US city named Marietta *Marietta, Illinois *Marietta, Indiana *Marietta, Kansas *Marietta, Minnesota *Marietta, Mississippi *Mar ...

market did not have a Fox affiliate of its own.

Cable Cable may refer to: Mechanical * Nautical cable, an assembly of three or more ropes woven against the weave of the ropes, rendering it virtually waterproof * Wire rope, a type of rope that consists of several strands of metal wire laid into a hel ...

systems on the West Virginia side of the market piped in

WVAH-TV WVAH-TV (channel 11) is a television station licensed to Charleston, West Virginia, United States, serving the Charleston–Huntington, West Virginia, Huntington media market, market as an affiliate of the digital multicast network Decades (TV n ...

from

Charleston Charleston most commonly refers to: * Charleston, South Carolina * Charleston, West Virginia, the state capital * Charleston (dance) Charleston may also refer to: Places Australia * Charleston, South Australia Canada * Charleston, Newfoundlan ...

, while cable systems on the Ohio side and satellite systems in the region carried

WTTE WTTE (channel 28) is a television station in Columbus, Ohio, United States, airing programming from the digital multicast network TBD. It is owned by Cunningham Broadcasting, which maintains a local marketing agreement (LMA) with Sinclair Broad ...

from

Columbus Columbus is a Latinized version of the Italian surname "''Colombo''". It most commonly refers to: * Christopher Columbus (1451-1506), the Italian explorer * Columbus, Ohio, capital of the U.S. state of Ohio Columbus may also refer to: Places ...

; both stations are owned by

Cunningham Broadcasting Cunningham Broadcasting Corporation is an owner of broadcast television stations in the United States. The company currently owns fifteen stations – eight affiliated with Fox, three affiliated with The CW, two affiliated with ABC, and two affili ...

and operated by

Sinclair Broadcast Group Sinclair Broadcast Group, Inc. (SBG) is a publicly traded American telecommunications conglomerate that is controlled by the descendants of company founder Julian Sinclair Smith. Headquartered in the Baltimore suburb of Cockeysville, Maryland, t ...

via local marketing agreements. On April 10, 2006, WTAP launched its Fox-affiliated second digital subchannel to serve as the area's first outlet for the network. To make the new service possible, the big three affiliate underwent a technical transformation. It carved out a new digital, high-definition-ready

master control Master control is the technical hub of a broadcast operation common among most over-the-air television stations and television networks. It is distinct from a production control room (PCR) in television studios where the activities such as switc ...

room from space previously used for storage. WTAP also installed an entirely digital production room. Despite the market gaining its own Fox affiliate, WVAH and WTTE continue to be offered on area cable systems. WOVA was born out of then-license holder Wood Investments LLC's sale of two low-power station licenses on channel 22 (previously holding the callsign WVEX-LP) and another station on UHF channel 47 (then using the callsign WWVX-LP) to Gray Television on April 10, 2012 for $66,000. Gray filed an application with the

Federal Communications Commission The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that regulates communications by radio, television, wire, satellite, and cable across the United States. The FCC maintains jurisdiction ...

(FCC) to change the callsign of WVEX-LP to WOVA-LP on July 18, 2012, and changed its city of license from Marietta to Parkersburg. On September 3, 2012, Fox programming moved to this new low-powered station after which WTAP-DT2 was shut down. The move allowed Fox programming to be broadcast over the air in high definition. On October 1, 2012, the station changed its call sign to WOVA-LD. On September 1, 2018, a

720p 720p (1280×720 px; also called HD ready, standard HD or just HD) is a progressive HDTV signal format with 720 horizontal lines/1280 columns and an aspect ratio (AR) of 16:9, normally known as widescreen HDTV (1.78:1). All major HDTV broadcast ...

HD feed (branded as "Parkersburg's CW 15/21") of

The CW ''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the m ...

's national

CW Plus CW may stand for: Science and technology * centiwatt (cW), one hundredth of a watt * Cω, a programming language * CW complex, a type of topological space * Carrier wave, in radio communications * CodeWarrior, an integrated development environm ...

service was added to subchannel 22.2; prior to September 1, 2018,

WQCW WQCW (channel 30), branded on air as Tri-State's CW, is a television station licensed to Portsmouth, Ohio, United States, serving as the CW affiliate for the Charleston– Huntington, West Virginia market. It is one of two commercial televisio ...

from the adjacent

Portsmouth, Ohio Portsmouth is a city in and the county seat of Scioto County, Ohio, United States. Located in southern Ohio south of Chillicothe, it lies on the north bank of the Ohio River, across from Kentucky, just east of the mouth of the Scioto River. ...

/Charleston–

Huntington, West Virginia Huntington is a city in Cabell and Wayne counties in the U.S. state of West Virginia. It is the county seat of Cabell County, and the largest city in the Huntington–Ashland metropolitan area, sometimes referred to as the Tri-State Area. A h ...

media market served as the default CW affiliate in Parkersburg, being offered to viewers through local cable and

satellite A satellite or artificial satellite is an object intentionally placed into orbit in outer space. Except for passive satellites, most satellites have an electricity generation system for equipment on board, such as solar panels or radioisotope ...

providers.

Programming

Syndicated programming

Syndicated programming on WOVA-LD includes ''

Family Guy ''Family Guy'' is an American animated sitcom originally conceived and created by Seth MacFarlane for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The show centers around the Griffin family, Griffins, a dysfunctional family consisting of parents Peter Griff ...

'', ''

Judge Judy ''Judge Judy'' is an American Court show#Arbitration-based reality court show, arbitration-based reality court show presided over by former Manhattan Family Court Judge Judy Sheindlin, Judith Sheindlin. The show featured Sheindlin as she adjudi ...

'', ''

Law & Order: Criminal Intent ''Law & Order: Criminal Intent'' is an American police procedural Drama (film and television), drama television series set in New York City, where it was also primarily produced. Created and Executive producer#Motion pictures and television, p ...

'', and ''

The People's Court ''The People's Court'' is an American arbitration-based reality court show, featuring an arbitrator handling small claims disputes in a simulated courtroom set. Within the court show genre, it is the first of all arbitration-based reality styl ...

'', among others.

Newscast

The station offers a weeknight prime time news broadcast known as ''Fox Parkersburg News at 10''. Airing for thirty minutes from a secondary set, the show mirrors local news seen on WTAP except for slightly different graphics and unique feature segments.

Technical information

Subchannels

The stations' digital signals are

multiplexed In telecommunications and computer networking, multiplexing (sometimes contracted to muxing) is a method by which multiple analog or digital signals are combined into one signal over a shared medium. The aim is to share a scarce resource - a ...

References

External links

* * * * {{Gray TV OVA-LD Low-power television stations in the United States Fox network affiliates Gray Television The CW affiliates Television channels and stations established in 2002 2002 establishments in West Virginia