KPLC, the NBC station in Lake Charles, La., was hit hard by Hurricane Laura. Now the station is trying to recover, but it’s going to take a while.
As TVSpy reported last week, the tower above the station collapsed as a result of high winds during the storm. The tower fell onto the station and into the studio, but fortunately everyone had previously evacuated the building.
While the staff cannot broadcast out of its studio at this time, repairs have begun on the damaged building.
“Within 20 hours of the hurricane hitting we already had crews mobilized coming here,” said general manager John Ware. “Today the heavy equipment arrives, three cranes. The tower crew is on sight. They’ll start lifting the tower out of our building, deconstructing it and moving it out of our way so that we can start operating safely again within the building.”
Ware says KPLC can still broadcast, but can’t get a signal out. Right now, the station is broadcasting from a temporary space outside of the building.
“This is the first step in being able to get back on television,” Ware said. “Our broadcast towers are fine, we just need to be able to get [the signal] out of our building so that we can re-establish a signal and start getting back to broadcasting on television in addition to our digital platforms.”