62 signal, would fill-in holes in the station's coverage area. The station claimed that the new 2,150,000-watt signal was the most powerful in the commonwealth. Some areas of Lexington, such as Chevy Chase, would be able to receive a clear signal from the station for the first time ever. CEO Johnson stated that Shamrock was investing over $2 million for these signal improvements. New newscast opening music and on-air imaging would accompany the channel change. Management had hoped to be on the air by Monday, June 23, in time to broadcast that evening's ABC prime time lineup. However, the crew realized that the channel 62 antenna was heavier than they realized, which required them to remove it in sections. That, along with high winds on Tuesday, delayed the sign-on of channel 36 to Wednesday, June 25. Channel 36 beamed to life for the first time in Lexington at 2:18 p.m. with a test pattern. 40 minutes later, the National Anthem was broadcast, completing the move to channel 36. WTVQ's old channel 62 transmitter was sold to a group that intended on starting a new station on channel 61 in Ashland, Kentucky (the transmitter would be retuned for use on that channel). (Channel 62, which remained allocated to Lexington and was not moved to Glasgow as originally proposed, would later be re-used by short-lived independent station WLKT and subsequent low-power station WBLU-LP.) Months after the move to channel 36 and improved product, tragedy struck at the station. 28-year-old weekend anchor Tom Howell died when his car collided with a city sanitation truck that ran a stop sign. Howell had been with the station less than a year. In June 1981, due to a poor showing in the May ratings book, the station dropped Nightline and replaced it with reruns of All in the Family. General manager Bill Service noted that the reruns ABC had previously been programming in the timeslot fared better locally than Nightline was. The station received over 75 phone calls and 25 letters from viewers expressing displeasure with the move. Nightline was restored to the schedule on August 17, at a new, later midnight timeslot, with the All in the Family reruns remaining in the same timeslot to "please both audiences", according to Service. The station underwent a $2 million renovation starting in 1985 that doubled the existing office space and created all-new technical facilities. The expanded facilities