If you were among those who found themselves channel-hopping on Saturday night, you might have noticed that you had fewer options than usual.
That’s because Saturday evening saw Channel 4, Channel 5 and a number of others temporarily going off the air .
While viewers of Channel 4 and its sister channels More4, Film4, E4 and 4Music were met with flashing images, Channel 5 and Welsh-language channel S4C also faced technical difficulties of their own.
It’s now been confirmed that these issues were due to a mass evacuation at the broadcast centre for these channels.
“We confirm that all staff at our Broadcast Centre in West London were safely evacuated following activation of the fire suppression systems,” a spokesperson for Red Bee Media.
“As a result of this incident and the automatic safety measures set in motion at the time, several services originating from the Broadcast Centre have been disrupted.
“London Fire Brigade attended the scene, and once they had determined that the building [was] safe, people were allowed to return to the building. We are continuing to work to restore all services and remedy any issues caused by this incident.”
Unfortunately, these technical issues went on to continue into Sunday morning, with Sunday Brunch viewers spotting disruptions during the live show.
A tweet from Channel 4 told viewers on Sunday morning: “We continue to experience disruption to our services due to technical issues.
“We’re working hard to resume our normal services and appreciate your continued understanding and patience.”
Sunday Brunch’s official Twitter page also addressed the technical issues in a tweet: