The Nightly Show

I'd say it was very unlikely they'd fake a breakdown for that reason, for a start the actual loss of programmes would probably send as many viewers over to other channels than attract at 10:30.

I wonder if it was a pre-emptive move because the TC could tell there was a problem with the second part. It would have been a late delivery so either it hadn't made it fully onto the system, or maybe it just didn't cue up or run.... and the interruption of the sponsorship sting was down to reaction time. That would also explain the colour bars - they tried to run the part. Are there still colour bars on the beginning of programmes in these days of file delivery?

STV's SD channel didn't have a breakdown caption. It showed the break bumper on a constant loop, which was almost headache-inducing. No breakdown music either.

Apologies about the poor quality.

Yes - I believe so (they still serve a purpose, along with tone sequences) - though I need to double check the rules for parts. I think they can be delivered as separate files or one file with breaks.

However I suspect The Nightly Show is a fast turnaround edit, so won't be a file delivery, and will either be played in as-live from an edit, or played in as a line-feed to a lines-record area.

This was my first thought too. There's always one, and it's usually where block bookings are involved...

Yes - though just a few seconds' worth.

I'm not sure why this would be the case, if they were having a catastrophic failure that forced the channel completely off air it wouldn't have mattered what they were showing. There are plenty of things that can go wrong with a recorded show as well - a corrupt or mislabelled file, for example. In many ways you could argue it's harder to get a pre-recorded show back because everyone's gone home.

I remember in the early weeks of Channel Five, that night's Jack Docherty Show couldn't be broadcast and they had to show a repeat at the last minute. I remember that because the planned show starred Paul Daniels and the repeat featured David Baddiel, and the next time Baddiel was on he asked what had happened because he'd heard his last appearance had been repeated because there was "a problem" with the Paul Daniels episode and he wondered if that was a euphemism. And Jack said they just had a massive techical fault and couldn't transmit it. But they did show it a couple of days later.

If something is being transmitted from the playout suite it is pretty resilient, with multiple servers meaning that each programme is available from multiple sources running in sync. If the suite is designed well there should be few single points of failure so the chances of staying on air are pretty good.

Compared to tape days, where there was just one copy for most things (some high profile shows would have a backing copy) it's unlikely that a pre-recorded show delivered in the normal way would have issues that are noticeable on air for more than a few seconds. (Late deliveries would be unlikely to have a duplicate tape due to the time taken to make a copy)

Where a programme is late delivery - which being recorded earlier in the evening the Nightly Show would be - they are often played in from an edit suite or OB vehicle rather than from the playout suite, so there are many things that are less resilient than standard programmes.

As expected, the press picked up on this:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-4354918/The-Nightly-suffers-technical-glitch-3-minutes.html
https://www.thesun.co.uk/tvandshowbiz/3193387/the-nightly-show-technical-glitch-blank-screen-ad-break/

Forgive my ignorance, but if The Nightly Show still went out in full after a three-minute unplanned pause, does this mean the News at (half past) Ten went out late and/or had to be shortened by three minutes as a result?

Didn't someone suggest that they'd just run the schedule late all night?

I can't imagine they'd cut the news short, being 3 mins late at 11:15 is hardly a major cause of concern. They'd just cut Jackpot 247 or Nightscreen

Would have been cut from Nightscreen I assume as Jackpot 247 didn't air last night (see ITV Disaster Recovery thread), they aired UTV-friendly Teleshopping instead which presumably has a fixed length and can't be cut because it's paid for.

I don't know how it works, but isn't it possible that a brief loss of signal could trigger a breakdown slide automatically, which is why it flashed up before the programme fell off air properly?