WDKA
Television station in Paducah, Kentucky
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
WDKA (channel 49) is a television station licensed to Paducah, Kentucky, United States, serving as the MyNetworkTV affiliate for Western Kentucky's Purchase region, Southern Illinois and Southeastern Missouri, and Northwest Tennessee. It is owned by Rincon Broadcasting Group alongside Cape Girardeau, Missouri–licensed Fox affiliate KBSI (channel 23); Sinclair Broadcast Group operates the two stations under a shared services agreement (SSA). WDKA and KBSI share studios on Enterprise Street in Cape Girardeau; WDKA's transmitter is located in Vienna, Illinois.
| |
| City | Paducah, Kentucky |
|---|---|
| Channels | |
| Branding | My 49 WDKA |
| Programming | |
| Affiliations |
|
| Ownership | |
| Owner |
|
| Operator | Sinclair Broadcast Group via SSA |
| KBSI | |
| History | |
| Founded | October 2, 1989 |
First air date | June 5, 1997 |
Former channel numbers |
|
Call sign meaning | Paducah (soundalike "K" substituting for "C") |
| Technical information[2] | |
Licensing authority | FCC |
| Facility ID | 39561 |
| ERP | 1,000 kW |
| HAAT | 327 m (1,073 ft) |
| Transmitter coordinates | 37°23′42″N 88°56′23″W |
| Translator(s) | KBSI 23.2 Cape Girardeau, MO |
| Links | |
Public license information | |
| Website | kbsi23 |
In addition to its own digital signal, WDKA is simulcast in standard definition on KBSI's second digital subchannel (23.2) from a transmitter north of Cape Girardeau in unincorporated Cape Girardeau County.
History
WDKA began broadcasting on June 5, 1997. It was a UPN affiliate broadcasting an analog signal on UHF channel 49.[3] In 2000, WDKA switched affiliations with low-powered station WQTV-LP (licensed to Murray, Kentucky) and repeater WQWQ-LP to become an affiliate of The WB. In September 2006, The WB and UPN merged to become The CW, and WQTV-LP was announced to become The CW affiliate for Paducah in advance of the merger. As a result, WDKA became affiliated with MyNetworkTV when it launched on September 5.
On August 30, 2014, WDKA became a charter affiliate of Sinclair's ad-hoc syndicated television network, the American Sports Network. ASN provided Ohio Valley Conference basketball and Conference USA football and basketball games to the station's viewers.[4][5] The ASN's programming content replaced Southeastern Conference football and basketball broadcasts from ESPN Plus-oriented SEC TV, which was run from 2009 until 2014, which was discontinued because of the launch of the pay TV-exclusive SEC Network.
On March 3, 2016, WDKA Acquisition Corporation (owned by Paul T. Lucci[6]) filed to sell WDKA to Sinclair's subsidiary WDKA Licensee, LLC.[7] Sinclair bought the station for $1.9 million.[8] The sale was completed on September 1, 2017.[9] Sinclair would continue to own WDKA and KBSI until both were sold to Community News Media for $28 million in a transaction that closed in 2021.[10][11]
On July 22, 2025, Sinclair announced that it had re-purchased the non-license assets of WDKA and KBSI, with an option to re-acquire the stations' broadcast licenses.[12]
On September 22, 2025, it was announced that Rincon Broadcasting Group would be buying WDKA and KBSI along with the other stations owned by Standard Media for $50 million, pending FCC approval.[1] The sale was completed on February 27, 2026.[13]
Technical information
Subchannels
The station's signal is multiplexed:
Analog-to-digital conversion
WDKA shut down its analog signal, over UHF channel 49, on February 17, 2009, the original target date on which full-power television stations in the United States were to transition from analog to digital broadcasts under federal mandate (which was pushed back to June 12, 2009). The station's digital signal remained on its pre-transition UHF channel 50, using virtual channel 49.[15]
Spectrum reallocation
In October 2019, WDKA reallocated its digital signal onto UHF channel 25 as a result of the station's participation in the FCC's spectrum incentive auction.