Wikipedia
WBMA-LD, virtual channel 58 ( UHF digital channel 40), is an ABC- affiliated television station located in Birmingham, Alabama, United States. The station is owned by the Sinclair Broadcast Group, as part of a de facto legal triopoly with CW affiliate WTTO (channel 21) and MyNetworkTV affiliate WABM (channel 68); Sinclair also operates Tuscaloosa-based WDBB (channel 17), which operates as a satellite station of WTTO, under a time brokerage agreement with Cunningham Broadcasting. WBMA-LD maintains studio facilities located at the Riverchase office park on Concourse Parkway in Hoover (with a Birmingham address), and its transmitter is located atop Red Mountain (near the Tarpley City neighborhood) in southwestern Birmingham.
WBMA transmits a low-power digital signal, which provides an over-the-air broadcasting radius that is effectively limited to Birmingham proper and nearby areas in Jefferson, Tuscaloosa, Walker, Bibb and Shelby counties. Because of this, the station's programming is simulcast as a digital subchannel on three other central Alabama stations that act as full-power relays – including those of WABM and WDBB – in order to reach the entire Birmingham–Tuscaloosa– Anniston market.
The station's brand name, "ABC 33/40", is derived from the two stations that operated as full-power satellite stations to distribute its programming to southwestern and northeastern areas of central Alabama from WBMA's acquisition of the ABC affiliation in September 1996 until October 2014, WCFT-TV (channel 33) in Tuscaloosa and WJSU-TV (channel 40) in Anniston, which now respectively operate as Heroes & Icons affiliates WSES and WGWW.