Analog Shutdown Wave, Second Group

The latest wave of analog TV shutdowns got underway Thursday, as April 16th was the first day that non-public TV outlets could go off the air before the moved digital TV deadline of June 12th.

Here in Northeast Ohio, a before/after check of Trinity Broadcasting O&O WDLI/17 Canton shows that the incredibly snowy analog channel 17 picture we saw last night was gone by this morning.

OMW reader and digital TV follower Rich Emery down in Hamilton(!), near Cincinnati, tells us he watched WDLI's TBN sister station in the Dayton/Cincinnati region - WKOI/43 Richmond IN - dump its analog carrier without fanfare at "exactly" 11:59 PM last night.

We haven't heard if TBN's new O&O in the Columbus market, WSFJ/51 Newark, did the same, though we'll assume they did.

On the commercial side, Wheeling/Steubenville is now an all-digital market, as Cox NBC affiliate WTOV/9 Steubenville made the switch at 12:30 PM Thursday. We're told the analog signal went away at that point, and the digital version of WTOV moved to RF channel 9 about five minutes later.

WTOV's competitor in the market, West Virginia Media CBS/Fox/ABC affiliate WTRF/7 Wheeling WV, made an identical change back on February 17th...also moving its temporary digital signal to a new permanent home on the old analog channel...