[Stooky Bill]

Yes they have always had a menu and a something prepped to read with it, it's just not normally read out during a breakdown

[Transmission]

Yep, the menu read is usually for a breakdown during a junction rather than a programme.

[thegeek]

The most recent example of a continuity announcer not being able to handle a break in transmission during Sunday Live this morning.

youtu.be 

It seems to have been caused by a snake getting in to the programme gallery. The continuity announcer probably wouldn't have even been in the same building but I suppose if she suffered from snakeaphbia then her ability to read coherently from the Radio Times may have been inhibited.

I think the snake in the gallery and the breakdown are unrelated - those bars are what you get when the switch at BT Tower disconnects. A classic case of the circuit not being booked for long enough and nobody having checked it beforehand. Looking back on iPlayer (which still includes the fault), it happened at exactly 1100, when I'd imagine they'd have wanted it to finish at 1200.

[Neil Jones]

You quite often see switching issues around the time the clocks change...

[thegeek]

yes, this one's quite a bit out of season!

[Johnr]

One thing I've always wondered about breakdowns like this...how come the presenters often seem completely oblivious to the fact the show has gone off air? (as in they seemed to have continued the item whilst off air and must have been told later on as they apologised later in the show for the disruption)

Surely the gallery would notice it had been knocked off air pretty quickly and communicated that through their earpiece?

Or if they did continue surely the footage could then be edited in to the iPlayer later rather than keeping the breakdown in that as well! (Granted it is only Sunday Morning Live so probably not a very high priority)

[bilky asko]

One thing I've always wondered about breakdowns like this...how come the presenters often seem completely oblivious to the fact the show has gone off air? (as in they seemed to have continued the item whilst off air and must have been told later on as they apologised later in the show for the disruption)

Surely the gallery would notice it had been knocked off air pretty quickly and communicated that through their earpiece?

Or if they did continue surely the footage could then be edited in to the iPlayer later rather than keeping the breakdown in that as well! (Granted it is only Sunday Morning Live so probably not a very high priority)

If they carry on, then the programme can be safely returned to as soon as a connection is re-established. It stops the risk of them coming back just as a presenter or contributor is saying something rude or defamatory.

[mcrdev]

If you're pretty confident it's not a problem at your end (i.e. you've still got power and your sending something down your outgoing lines), even once you know you've dropped off air, you don't know how long it's going to take to get back on. It might take a second or it might be unfixable. Better to carry on with the expectation it'll just be a switch to a backup feed and back on within seconds than just give up and have to try and work out when to restart and get back into your running order.

Of course, you may get hints as to why you've fallen off air based on what you see on the off-air, but until you can start talking about it, you don't know what the issue actually is.

If it's an extended issue, programmes often will arrange a restart, but that's more common when you've had to go to standby programming while the problem is fixed as it gives you the time (and confidence that you won't suddenly be cut to air).

[Spencer]

I would imagine in the heat of the moment it’s not always easy to tell immediately that the programme isn’t still going out somewhere. If there’s even the remotest chance that someone somewhere could still be watching, it’s safest to carry on regardless.

[Stooky Bill]

I would imagine in the heat of the moment it’s not always easy to tell immediately that the programme isn’t still going out somewhere. If there’s even the remotest chance that someone somewhere could still be watching, it’s safest to carry on regardless.

Yes these days that's very possible, especially when the programme could be going out online or somewhere like Ireland like some ITV live shows are.

They discovered this in the early days of television when the BBC opened its second TV transmitter.....

txfeatures.mb21.co.uk 

mb21 - The Transmission Gallery
UK Broadcast Transmission THE TRANSMISSION GALLERY TALES FROM A COLD FIELD Being…
  Source: txfeatures.mb21.co.uk