ABC 33/40

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ABC 33/40 is a television station serving as the ABC affiliate for the Birmingham, Alabama, television market. It is broadcast by WBMA-LD (channel 58), a low-power station, in the immediate Birmingham area, as well as on subchannels of WABM (68.2) in Birmingham, WDBB (17.2) in Tuscaloosa, and WGWW (40.2) in Anniston. ABC 33/40 is owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group alongside WABM and WTTO (channel 21) and originates from studios in the Riverchase office park on Concourse Parkway in Hoover. In 1994, a major realignment of television station affiliations was slated to affect Birmingham, with Birmingham's existing ABC affiliate, WBRC, designated to switch to Fox. As a result, ABC needed a new affiliate in the market. A number of stations were available, including in Birmingham itself. The network instead opted to partner with Allbritton Communications to buy WCFT-TV (channel 33) in Tuscaloosa and WJSU-TV (channel 40) in Anniston. Since 1970, these stations had served as CBS affiliates for western and eastern Alabama, respectively. On September 1, 1996, they became the ABC affiliate for the entire Birmingham market, branded ABC 33/40. At the same time, the station opened its Birmingham-area studio in Hoover. ABC 33/40 made national headlines in 1997 as the only ABC affiliate not to air the episode of Ellen in which Ellen DeGeneres came out as a lesbian. Bolstered by the defections of popular on-air talent such as meteorologist James Spann and anchor Brenda Ladun from the top-rated WBRC news department, ABC 33/40 debuted at third place in local news ratings and rose to second place by the early 2000s, on occasion finishing in first place. In 2014, Sinclair acquired Allbritton. The companies together owned too many television station licenses in the Birmingham area, resulting in the sale of the WCFT and WJSU facilities to Howard Stirk Holdings. This...