At about 8am Wednesday, the antenna used to broadcast WKBN-TV and FOX Youngstown will be turned off for about 12 hours.
A crew is going to remove the 4,000 lb. analog antenna from the top of the tower, lower it to the ground, and mount the digital antenna in its place. The work, if all goes as planned, will take about 12 hours.
During this time, the antenna will need to be turned off. This will leave viewers of WKBN-TV and FOX Youngstown without a signal unless they are subscribers to Armstrong or Time-Warner cable systems. Both Armstrong and Time-Warner are fed their signal through fiber-optic lines before it reaches the tower. Antenna, satellite, and other cable subscribers will have to wait until the work is finished.
This is the final step for WKBN-TV and FOX Youngstown to complete the transition to DTV. Until now, the digital antenna has been on a side mount several hundred feet below the top of the tower. The additional height should improve the digital signal, probably to be noticed only by those viewers in fringe areas.
Light winds are necessary to safely carry out the work, and the crew expects both stations to be transmitting through the relocated antenna by 8pm Wednesday evening.
