WDBJ

WDBJ, channel 7, is a CBS-affiliated television station located in Roanoke, Virginia, United States. WDBJ is owned by Schurz Communications, and maintains studio facilities on Hershberger Road in northwest Roanoke; its transmitter is located on Poor Mountain in Roanoke County.

WDBJ became the center of international media attention on August 26, 2015, when two of its employees, reporter Alison Parker and photojournalist Adam Ward, were shot dead while on live television. The gunman was later identified by police as former WDBJ reporter Vester Lee Flanagan II, who was fired from the station two years earlier and died from self-inflicted gunshot wounds five hours after the shooting.

History

Early history

WDBJ-TV first signed on the air on October 3, 1955, originally owned by the Times-World Corporation, publishers of the Roanoke Times and Roanoke World-News, and operators of WDBJ radio (960 AM, now WFIR; and 94.9 FM, now WSLC-FM). Channel 7 has been a CBS affiliate since its sign-on, owing to WDBJ radio's longtime affiliation with the CBS Radio Network. WDBJ-TV was the third television station to sign-on from Roanoke, after NBC affiliate WSLS-TV (channel 10) and WROV-TV (channel 27, frequency later occupied by WFXR), which operated as an independent station from February to July 1953. Before channel 7 signed on, CBS programming had been carried part-time on Lynchburg-based WLVA-TV (channel 13, now WSET-TV). During the late 1950s, WDBJ was also briefly affiliated with the NTA Film Network.