WGHP - News Operation

News Operation

WGHP broadcasts a total of 46 1/2 hours of local news a week (eight on half hours on weekdays, and two hours each on Saturdays and Sundays), more than any other television station in the state of North Carolina. Local news has been a stable product on WGHP since it went on the air in 1963. During the 1960s and 1970s, advertisements showed local newscasts airing variously sometimes at noon, 6 and 11 p.m., and sometimes at 7 p.m. During the late 1980s and early 1990s WGHP sporadically maintained a full 24-hour broadcast schedule so early morning hours 11 p.m. newscast rebroadcasts were only scheduled when ABC network programming extended long enough to warrant the scheduling of the rebroadcast; in 1994, the station began programming 24 hours a day.

During the 1980s, various local long-form morning news programming was carried, eventually settling in to 5-minute updates during ABC's Good Morning America with a noon newscast (dropped in the late 1980s). In the early 1990s, the morning newscast began as an hour-long 6 a.m. newscast, along with a 5 p.m. newscast that expanded to a full hour in 1994. In the last years as an ABC affiliate, ABC's Nightline was delayed by 30 minutes for more profitable syndicated programming, mostly M*A*S*H. At the time of the sale to Fox in 1995, WGHP aired three hours of news daily with the traditional 11 p.m. newscast moving to 10 p.m. and expanding to a full hour, with the daily news output overall expanding to 4½ hours daily immediately after the sale and that time has continuously expanded ever since to the current 8 hours daily with a five-hour morning newscast, a half-hour noon newscast, a 90-minute block of news from 5 to 6:30 p.m. and the primetime 10 p.m. newscast.

From the time that WGHP affiliated with Fox in 1995 and then became a Fox owned-and-operated station in 1996, the station has put more emphasis on its local newscasts; news was expanded to 3½ (later four) hours on weekday mornings, plus the addition of a 5:30 p.m. newscast. WGHP is of only two ex-New World station that Fox did not relaunch a 11 p.m. newscast on its schedule before the completion of the Local TV purchase, as Fox did with some of its other O&O stations (Cleveland's WJW (channel 8) is the other).

WGHP is one of only two ex-New World stations and former Fox O&Os (along with WJW-TV 8 in Cleveland) sold to Local TV without a newscast in the traditional late news timeslot (former sister station WBRC in Birmingham—now owned by Raycom Media—along with WDAF in Kansas City and WITI in Milwaukee already had 10 p.m. newscasts along with its 9 p.m. newscast long before the Local TV purchase and KTVI in St. Louis added a 10 p.m. newscast after its 9 p.m. newscast in 2008, just before the sale closed). Other than WJW and WGHP, KTBC in Austin (which remains an Fox O&O) is the only other ex-New World station without a newscast in the traditional late news timeslot.

On September 13, 2009 starting with the 10 p.m. newscast, WGHP became the first station in the Piedmont Triad in true 16:9 widescreen format (not HD), not only in the studio but local remote live reports also. As of early 2010, WGHP would be joined by the other two major news stations—WFMY-TV and WXII-TV—in broadcasting local newscasts in upconverted widescreen SDTV (at least from the studio). On September 12, 2010 starting with the 10 p.m. newscast, WGHP began broadcasting its local newscasts in 720p high definition, making WGHP the first station in the Piedmont Triad to broadcast its local news programming in high definition. It remained the only station in the Piedmont Triad with high-definition local newscasts for over a year until November 13, 2011 when WFMY-TV upgraded its newscasts from enhanced definition widescreen to full high definition. However, WGHP remains the only station in the Piedmont Triad that broadcasts all of its field video in high definition (WFMY broadcasts in HD from the studio but still broadcasts its field video in ED widescreen).

On September 12, 2011, WGHP expanded its weekday morning newscast by one hour, adding former employee Nicole Ferguson, and Kerry Charles and Katie Nordeen; it now runs for five hours from 5 to 10 a.m.

Mid December 2011, the weekday 6pm newscast began rebroadcasts on TV8.2 at 7pm.

On January 9, 2012, the morning news expanded beginning at 4:30 a.m. and lasting until 10:00 a.m. for a total of five and a half hours of morning news daily. This expands the total amount of news coverage to 46½ hours weekly.