City | Seattle, Washington |
---|---|
Broadcast area | Puget Sound region, Washington |
Branding | KIRO Radio 97.3 FM ("KIRO" pronounced as "Cairo") |
Slogan | Seattle's News. Seattle's Talk. |
Frequency | 97.3 MHz FM (also on HD Radio) 97.3-2 FM: KIRO simulcast 97.3-3 FM: Mormon Channel |
First air date | 1960 |
Format | News/Talk |
ERP | 55,000 watts |
HAAT | 729 meters |
Class | C |
Facility ID | 33682 |
Transmitter coordinates | 47°30′14″N 121°58′29″W / 47.50389°N 121.97472°WCoordinates: 47°30′14″N 121°58′29″W / 47.50389°N 121.97472°W |
Callsign meaning | See KIRO (AM) for history and reasoning |
Former callsigns | KTNT (1960-1972) KNBQ (1972-1988) KBSG (1988-2008) |
Affiliations | CBS Radio, KIRO 7, Seattle Seahawks, Seattle Sounders Radio Network |
Owner |
Bonneville International (Bonneville International Corporation) |
Sister stations |
KTTH KIRO-AM |
Webcast | Listen Live |
Website | www.kiroradio.com |
KIRO-FM (97.3 FM) is a radio station in Seattle, Washington, United States, with a news/talk radio format. The outlet is associated with the CBS Radio Network. The station's transmitter is on Tiger Mountain near Issaquah, while its studios are located in Seattle's Eastlake district.
KIRO-FM broadcasts in the HD (digital) radio format.
The station was founded as KTNT-FM and was owned by the Tacoma News Tribune. It began broadcasting October 26, 1948. The station exclusively targeted Tacoma and South Puget Sound. In 1972, the call letters were changed to KNBQ, which were later used on 102.9 FM. At that time, the station carried a Top 40 format branded simply as "97.3 KNBQ". When the Tacoma News Tribune sold KNBQ to Viacom in 1987, the station enforced a policy of not talking over music, which did not help its dismal ratings. The station would move its transmitter to Tiger Mountain during this time to better target the Seattle market as a whole. On February 1, 1988, the station flipped to its long running oldies format as "K-Best 97.3" and picked up the KBSG call letters. On August 1, 2007, KBSG was rebranded from "KBSG 97.3" to "The New B97.3", and dropped the word 'oldies' from the station title.
Exactly one year later, on August 1, 2008, the station's call letters were changed to KIRO-FM.
On August 12, 2008 at 4:23 AM, KBSG's frequency began to simulcast sister news/talk radio station KIRO; the final song as a classic hits station, Start Me Up by the Rolling Stones, faded out as the FM station joined KIRO AM's Wall Street Journal This Morning in progress.