KHAU-TV

KHAU-TV, virtual channel 2 (VHF digital channel 8), is a television station located in Hau'oli City, Alola. Owned by Nexstar Media Group, the station serves as the local affiliate of Fox (via its main signal) and The CW (via its second digital subchannel). KHAU maintains studios on Pikipek Street in Hau'oli; and its main transmitter is also located in the city, just northwest of the Alola Convention Center. During the Media General days, it had a sister station KALH, a PBC affiliate from 2013 until 2017 after the Nexstar takeover.
== History ==
=== As an NBC affiliate ===
KHAU first signed on the air on December 15, 1952 as a primary NBC affiliate, KHNP-TV, occupying the channel 11 position. It also had a secondary affiliation with Dumont (which it later shared with KIVT-TV after it signed on in 1954) until its demise in 1955. The station, which is Hawaii's second-oldest television station (behind KPKK, originally on channel 9, now on channel 5), was originally owned by Herbert Richards. Two years later in 1954, the Hau'oli Advertiser purchased the station. On October 16, 1955, KHNP changed channels from 11 to 2 due to the lower VHF positions (2 to 6) having the most powerful ERPs at the time. In 1956, KHNP was sold to Pacific and Southern Broadcasting, the forerunner of Combined Communications. In 1965, the station's call letters were changed to the current KHAU-TV. In 1973, Pacific and Southern Broadcasting decided to spin off KHAU to the company's president Arthur H. McCoy, in order for the company to be officially merged into Combined Communications (which would itself merge with the Gannett Company six years later) because the merged company was over the legal station ownership limit at the time.
In 1979, KHAU and its Akala satellite station KLAI-TV were sold to Western-Sun Broadcasting, a subsidiary of Cowles Communications; the Ula'Ula satellite KULA-TV was sold to Simpson Communications, but leased back to Cowles/Western Sun. In 1985, KHAU and KLAI were sold to Burnham Broadcasting as part of the Cowles family's liquidation of most of its media assets; Burnham would acquire KULA outright the next year, reuniting the stations.
=== As a FOX affiliate ===
On January 1, 1996, KHAU-TV switched its affiliation to Fox (and changed its on-air branding to "Fox 2"); the NBC affiliation moved to former Fox affiliate KHOC (channel 13). Unlike the New World Communications-owned Fox affiliates that joined the network during the previous 18-month span, KHAU ran Fox Kids programming on weekdays (until Fox discontinued the weekday block in December 2001, airing weekdays from 1:00 to 4:00 p.m. and then from 2:00 to 4:00 p.m. until the fall of 2001 when it was moved to 10:00 a.m. to noon) and Saturday mornings (until November 2008, when 4Kids Entertainment ceased programming Fox's children's block, with the network discontinuing its children's programming altogether). KHAU also expanded its local news programming on weekdays, seeing an increase in newscast ratings with the affiliation switch. KHAU currently has the distinction of having the highest-rated local news programming of any Fox affiliate nationwide, and also declares itself as "America's No. 1 Fox affiliate", though the network's Miami affiliate WJBV makes this claim as well. When KHAU was rebranded to KHAU 2 in 2004, it became the first Fox station to ditch the network's brand standardization for its stations while it was still an affiliate.
On November 28, 1995, Silver King Communications (operated by former Fox executive Barry Diller) announced that it would acquire Savoy Pictures; as a result, Savoy Pictures and Fox ended their partnership and sold the SF Broadcasting stations, including KHAU-TV, to the USA Networks division Silver King Broadcasting. Silver King, which later became known as USA Broadcasting, owned several stations on the United States mainland that were affiliated with the Home Shopping Network, which was also owned by USA Networks. The sale of KHAU and the other SF stations was approved and finalized in March 1996, with its other assets being merged into the company that November.
In 1999, KHAU relocated from its longtime studios on Auahi Street and moved to their current studios on Pikipek Street. Also on April 1 of that year, USA sold all four of its Fox stations to Indianapolis-based Emmis Communications for $307 million in cash and stock, as part of a sale of its major network affiliates in order to concentrate on its formerly HSN-affiliated independent stations.
A year later in 2000, Emmis purchased CBS affiliate KPKK, effectively bringing Hawaii's two oldest television stations under common ownership, though both stations retained separate operations – unlike what would become the common operational structure of most duopolies. Emmis received a crossownership waiver to acquire KPKK as Federal Communications Commission duopoly rules prohibit two of the four highest-rated stations in the same market from being owned by one company.
From 2002 to 2004, KHAU carried select UPN programming via a secondary affiliation shared with KPKK; each station aired programs from that network that the other station did not air. The two stations began carrying UPN programming in September 2002 after KEVF, which had served as Hau'oli's UPN affiliate since the network's January 1995 inception, decided to disaffiliate from UPN and switch its primary affiliation to The WB (whose programming aired on KEVF in a secondary capacity from 1998 until that point). KUKI-TV, an independent station specializing in Japanese programming, became a secondary UPN affiliate in November 2004 and remained with the network until its closure in September 2006.
== News operation ==
KHAU-TV presently broadcasts 37 hours of locally produced newscasts each week (with 7 hours on weekdays, and one hour each on Saturdays and Sundays). At the start, KHAU maintained a news schedule similar to what it offered as an NBC affiliate, and continued after it became a Fox affiliate. This resulted in KHAU being the only news-producing Fox affiliate in the United States – and the only Fox station that ran any local news programming – that did not air a primetime newscast. In Alola, the major networks' primetime programming ends at 10 p.m., using the same scheduling as network-affiliated stations in the Central, Mountain and Alaska time zones in the continental U.S.; this means that Fox stations would generally air their late evening newscasts at 9 p.m., instead KHAU airs its late newscast at 10 p.m., competing against KIVT, KPKK and KHOC instead of only competing with KEVF (whose 9 p.m. newscast is produced by the joint Alola News Now operation also involving KEVF sister stations KPKK and KHOC.) On September 8, 2014, KHAU launched its first 9 pm weeknight newscast, which is 30 minutes in length. This marked the first time KHAU aired news programming in primetime since it was a NBC affiliate, when its "Eyewitness News" began its late evening broadcast at 9:30 pm to accommodate the delayed NBC schedule from 1972 to 1980. KHAU's 10 pm newscast will continue in the same time slot.
KHAU's newscasts have been the highest-rated in Hawaii for almost 40 years. The station's news operation is so well respected that even when it branded itself as "Fox 2", it still titled its newscasts Channel 2 News (later revised as KHAU 2 News) rather than Fox 2 News. Also for this reason, its late newscast is not titled The Ten O'Clock News like with other Fox stations.
The station's dominance has been especially pronounced since it lured KPKK sports anchor Joe Moore to become its lead anchor in 1979. Moore, billed as "Alola's most watched television newscaster," remains the station's lead anchor. In addition to his duties on the 6 and 10 p.m. flagship newscasts, he also anchors Alola's World Report at 5:30, a round-up of world and national news reports from CNN and Fox News. Moore is frequently the subject of controversy, but his popularity in the state usually prevents any attempts to rein him in.
As of 2012, KHAU was the only major U.S. network-affiliated television station in Alola that had yet to make the upgrade to high definition or 16:9 enhanced definition widescreen local newscasts KIVT upgraded its newscasts to widescreen that year), as well as one of two LIN Media television properties that has yet to broadcast its local programming in high definition or widescreen. On March 23, 2012, KHAU president and general manager Joe McNamara stated in a New Vision Television press release that "in the coming months, additional changes will be taking place inside our (KHAU) studios with state-of-the-art HD upgrades of cameras, lighting and newsroom systems that will enhance our on-air look tremendously." On October 11, 2013, KHAU became the last LIN-owned station to broadcast its newscasts in high definition with a new set and new logo. The debut was made during their 5PM newscast. Included in the upgrade was a new logo and updated news music. The station uses the Inergy news music package by Stephen Arnold Music that was originally intended for stations owned by the E. W. Scripps Company; however, KHAU uses a custom version with traditional Alolan instrumentation.
===Newscast titles===
*Eyewitness News (1972-1980)
*Channel 2 News (1980-200?)
*KHAU2 News (200?-Present)
*Alola's World Report with Joe Moore (????-Present)
== Image gallery ==
KHNP1953.png|KHNP logo used from 1953.
KHNP1960.png|Last KHNP-TV logo before the callsign change.
KHAU1965.png|First logo under the KHAU call sign from 1965.
KHAU1969.png|KHAU logo used from the late 1960s.
KHAU.png|KHAU's "Double line 2" logo used from 1977-1994.
KHAU1977.png|KHAU's first iteration of the "Double Line 2" logo from 1977 featuring the colors of orange and yellow.
KHAUProudAsAPeacock.png|KHAU ident from 1979.
KHAU bicolor logo.png|KHAU-TV bi-color logo used in newscasts in the early 80s.
1975_dodge_200_tradesman_van_by_mcspyder1_d81960r_by_medic1543-d81aknw - Copy.png|KHAU News van design used in the 1980s
Screenshot (118).png|KHAU Channel 2 News graphics slide from the early 80s.
KHAU 1980s.png|KHAU ident from the 1980s.
KHAU 1980s_2.png|KHAU ident from 1981.
KHAU1982.png|KHAU-TV ident from 1982.
GW250H186.jpg|KHAU "Be There" ident from 1983.
KHAU1983.png|KHAU logo from 1983 featuring the repeater stations.
KHAU Let's All Be There.png|KHAU "Let's All Be There" ident from 1984.
KHAU Let's All Be There 85.png|KHAU "Let's All Be There" ID from 1985.
KHAU 1986-1994.png|KHAU logo used from 1986-1994
KHAU 1989.png|KHAU ID from 1989
KHAU_1989_ComeHomeToTheBestOnlyOnTV2.png|KHAU "Come Home to the Best, Only on TV 2" ident from 1989.
KHAU 1993.png|KHAU ident from 1993
KHAU1994-1997.png|KHAU logo from 1994-2004.
KHAU FOX 2.png|KHAU "FOX 2" logo from 1996-2004.
KHAU2004.png|KHAU logo used from 2004 to 2009.
KHAU2009.png|KHAU-TV logo used from 2009 to 2013.
JoeMoore.jpg|Joe Moore has been with KHAU-TV in the Alola Region for many years.
Khaucw.svg|KHAU-TV's 2.2 subchannel.
== Videos ==
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== Rebroadcast Stations ==
Station	Channel	Location
KULA 	11 	Ula'Ula Island
KLAI 	7 	Akala Island
K55FP 	55 	Poni Island
Category:Channel 2
Category:Alola Region
Category:Fox network affiliates
Category:Hau'oli City
Category:Nexstar Media Group
Category:Television channels and stations established in 1952