Vietnamese language
Vietnamese () is an Austroasiatic languages, Austroasiatic language Speech, spoken primarily in Vietnam where it is the official language. It belongs to the Vietic languages, Vietic subgroup of the Austroasiatic language family. Vietnamese is s ...
radio station
Radio broadcasting is the broadcasting of audio (sound), sometimes with related metadata, by radio waves to radio receivers belonging to a public audience. In terrestrial radio broadcasting the radio waves are broadcast by a land-based rad ...
based in
Houston, Texas
Houston ( ) is the List of cities in Texas by population, most populous city in the U.S. state of Texas and in the Southern United States. Located in Southeast Texas near Galveston Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, it is the county seat, seat of ...
, United States, owned by Gow Media, LLC. KGOW's programming schedule is leased to a third party group that utilizes the broadcast day to air Vietnamese focused programming for southwest Houston, Bellaire, and the areas in southwest Harris County where 1560's signal is strongest. Viet Radio programming is simulcasted on 1480
KNGO
KNGO (1480 AM broadcasting, AM) is a commercial radio, commercial Vietnamese Full-service radio, full service radio station licensed to serve Dallas, Dallas, Texas, and covering the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex. It calls itself "Viet Radio" and s ...
Dallas
Dallas () is a city in the U.S. state of Texas and the most populous city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the List of Texas metropolitan areas, most populous metropolitan area in Texas and the Metropolitan statistical area, fourth-most ...
.
The daytime transmitter site is located in
Lochridge, Texas
Lochridge is an unincorporated community located in Brazoria County, Texas, United States. It formerly had a distinct community. It is located within the Greater Houston metropolitan area.
History
Lochridge began with a farm and a grocery stor ...
Katy, Texas
Katy is a city in the U.S. state of Texas. It is in the Greater Katy area, itself forming the western part of the Greater Houston metropolitan area. Homes and businesses may have Katy postal addresses without being in the City of Katy. The city ...
and Hockley, Texas. KGOW used its nighttime authorization at 15 kilowatts full-time, as the 46 kilowatt daytime site was damaged by floodwaters during a flooding event in 2016, then again in
Hurricane Harvey
Hurricane Harvey was a devastating tropical cyclone that made landfall in Texas and Louisiana in August 2017, causing catastrophic flooding and more than 100 deaths. It is tied with 2005's Hurricane Katrina as the costliest tropical cy ...
. KGOW did not operate on the day power for over one year, authorized by the Federal Communications Commission through a Special Temporary Authority that allows KGOW to operate at reduced power until which time the daytime site could be repaired. This occurred in March 2018.
The studios are located in
Uptown Houston
Uptown (more commonly called The Galleria Area) is a business district in Houston, located west of Downtown Houston, Downtown and is centered along Post Oak Boulevard and Westheimer Road (Farm to Market Road 1093). The Uptown District is rou ...
one block from
The Galleria
The Galleria, stylized theGalleria and also known as the Houston Galleria, is an upscale mixed-use urban development and shopping mall located in the Uptown District of Houston, Texas, United States.Bellaire.
History
1560 first appeared in south Texas as KGUL, based in Port Lavaca, Texas. It was, at one time, a sister station to 95.9 (now
KHMC
KHMC and KHMC-FM1 (95.9 FM) is a terrestrial American radio station
Radio broadcasting is the broadcasting of audio (sound), sometimes with related metadata, by radio waves to radio receivers belonging to a public audience. In terrestr ...
) and 93.3 (now KNAL).
1270 KIOX, licensed to Bay City, Texas, through the ill-advised actions of its owner at the time, moved KIOX from Bay City to Stafford Texas without proper FCC permission, wishing to capitalize on the money that could be commanded from having the signal closer to the Houston market, and directly within the exploding suburbs of Stafford, Missouri City, and Sugar Land. The station then applied and was granted a call set change to KFCC. After the Federal Communications Commission investigated the illegal move, KFCC's license was deleted, and the facility went dark. After it was clear that KFCC was permanently deleted, the principals secured a front "real party in interest" to take the KGUL Port Lavaca facility to Houston instead. Now KILE, it originally operated with 800 watts from just south of the 610 South Loop, then later 5,000 watts on a simple directional system, retaining the 800 watts for nighttime operation. KILE featured programming with a Multi-Language
talk radio
Talk radio is a radio format containing discussion about topical issues and consisting entirely or almost entirely of original spoken word content rather than outside music. They may feature monologues, dialogues between the hosts, Interview (jo ...
format, and was the only one in the Houston area to broadcast in many languages. This format remained in place until August 1, 2007, when Gow Media was ready to begin transmission testing from the new 46 kilowatt daytime and 15 kilowatt nighttime facilities. As a stunt, Gow Media began airing classic hits on KILE for the testing purposes. After testing concluded, a sports/guy talk format debuted on KILE (now as KGOW) on August 20, 2007, under the name of "1560 The Game", and becoming the flagship station of Gow Media and Sporting News Radio. After a few months on the air, KGOW dropped the guy talk portion of the format and focused solely on sports talk and game time play by play for various sporting events around Houston.
The sports format ended on September 30, 2017. The former "SB Nation 1560" was moved to FM, on relay translator K231CN
Houston
Houston ( ) is the List of cities in Texas by population, most populous city in the U.S. state of Texas and in the Southern United States. Located in Southeast Texas near Galveston Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, it is the county seat, seat of ...
as "Sports Map 94.1". K231CN is allegedly fed by KGOW sister station
KFNC
KFNC (97.5 FM broadcasting, FM; "ESPN Houston") is a commercial radio, commercial radio station city of license, licensed to Mont Belvieu, Texas. KFNC is paired with a broadcast relay station, translator, K223CW, licensed to Houston. The facili ...
's HD2 subchannel, though no evidence has ever been found that KFNC is actually broadcasting an HD2 channel.
Facility operations
During daytime hours, KGOW transmits from near Rosharon, TX, SSW of Houston, with 46,000 watts. At night, KGOW transmits from near Cypress-Katy, TX, NW of Houston, with 15,000 watts. The highly directive nature of both the daytime antenna array (six towers, with high efficiency) and the nighttime antenna array (nine towers, with standard efficiency) means that the apparent power towards Houston is greatly in excess of the licensed power, about the equivalent of 857,000 watts days and 197,000 watts nights (when compared to the 1,000 watt non-directional reference antenna for this class of station, Class B). This effect is shared by a number of other Class B stations in the Houston market. Houston has no allocated Class A stations (the only Class A stations in Texas are allocated to Dallas, KRLD, 1080 kHz; Fort Worth, WBAP, 820 kHz; and San Antonio, WOAI, 1200 kHz).