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Fallout still heavy from Kansas-Missouri TV snafu
- Thread starter nomadcowatbk
- Start date
It has nothing to do with sunspots. This happens twice a year near the vernal and autumnal equinoxes. When the sun is directly in-line with the satellite and receiving station, the sun overpowers the satellite and there is an LOS for a few minutes. It's physics and there is no easy way to fix this. CBS could switch to a different uplink satellite, but you don't know if the problem occurred on the uplink from the game to CBS, from CBS to the distribution satellite, or the downlinks from CBS to the various affiliates.
Switching to a different satellite during LOS is an option, but you would have to have a transponder on a different satellite ready to go, switch, have all affiliates switch, then switch back, and have all affiliates switch back.
Switching to a different satellite during LOS is an option, but you would have to have a transponder on a different satellite ready to go, switch, have all affiliates switch, then switch back, and have all affiliates switch back.
I said sunspots on the brain, implying a lack of coordination and communication between the affiliate and the network. The same outage occurred in Topeka, Springfield, Columbia and St. Louis, but only briefly. KCTV and CBS went through a variety of excuses Saturday, blaming each other, blaming sunspots, blaming technical difficulties - now they both look like idiots.
FWIW, I didn't think we were close enough to the equinox for those outages to occur yet.
FWIW, I didn't think we were close enough to the equinox for those outages to occur yet.
The outage was not caused by sunspots. It was caused by the sun passing behind or nearly behind the satellite.
My employer used to have a dedicated satellite data link between the US and Ecuador. The ground stations were in Miami and Quito. The satellite was at an azimuth of 270 degrees and an elevation of 45 degreees from Quito, at 117 degrees west longitude.
The sun outages at Quito began on March 7 and ended on April 2. The outages lasted from 9 minutes at the beginning and end, and 43 minutes during the middle of the period. At Miami, the outages started on March 5 and ended on March 13. The shortest outage was 7 minutes and the longest was 13 minutes. The fall outages at Quito went from September 9 to October 5. At Miami, it was September 9 to October 7.
My employer used to have a dedicated satellite data link between the US and Ecuador. The ground stations were in Miami and Quito. The satellite was at an azimuth of 270 degrees and an elevation of 45 degreees from Quito, at 117 degrees west longitude.
The sun outages at Quito began on March 7 and ended on April 2. The outages lasted from 9 minutes at the beginning and end, and 43 minutes during the middle of the period. At Miami, the outages started on March 5 and ended on March 13. The shortest outage was 7 minutes and the longest was 13 minutes. The fall outages at Quito went from September 9 to October 5. At Miami, it was September 9 to October 7.
I believe that what many of you are erroneously referring to as "sun spots" is actually called sun fade. At the station where I used to work, we had to deal with it for a few days every spring and fall. We had to have backup programming ready to go once the sun (briefly) overrode the satellite signal. It didn't directly affect me because I worked primarily overnights, but sometimes the daytime staffers would leave me prerecorded programming (for playback during my shift) with unexplained gaps in it, that I later determined were caused by sun fade at the time the program was taped.
The GM of KCTV was the one who came up with the "sun spots" excuse. You would think he would use the correct terminology to make his excuse more believable. And why did the "sun spots" happen exactly at tip-off of the next game? My guess is there was solar interference expected on the satellite carrying the dedicated Kansas/Mizzou feed during the game so they used the national CBS feed, which was supposed to switch to Michigan/MSU at tip off. That's why a lot of affiliates lost the Kansas/Mizzou game at the same time. Solar interference would hit St Louis first, then hit Kansas City after 15 minutes, then Topeka 5 minutes after that. It wouldn't hit every city at exactly the time of tip-off. The affiliates who kept the game knew which feed to switch to, but KCTV dropped the ball. The solar interference couldn't have knocked out the dedicated feed to Kansas City and Columbia in the final 3 minutes, since Joplin (which is located about halfway between the two cities) had the Kansas/Mizzou game feed.
There, I just gave a better explanation than the GM himself.
There, I just gave a better explanation than the GM himself.
I'm sorry, but I just couldn't read all the story with the ignorance on display from that writer and the station GM. For example:
"It’s a phenomenon that even industry insiders struggle to explain."
No we don't. As others have stated here, it's twice a year that the sun, satellite and dish are all perfectly aligned. The sun overpowers the satellite signal with it's energy and you lose the signal for a few minutes. What's so hard to explain about that?
"“It was a rare occurrence."
No it's not. Happens twice a year.
Bobby Totsch, vice president and general manager of KCTV, said [...] that sunspots were a factor
I recommend to Mr Totsch that he stick to managing the station and stay out of the engineering department. Sunspots? Seriously?
He said KCTV has three satellite receivers: one primary and two backups.
That's great, unless all three receivers are looking at the same satellite you doof. Again, stay out of the engineering department, Mr Totsch. (on a side note, why can they not get the chief engineer to make these statements. You know, someone who has a clue?)
Totsch said the decision to outsource the station’s master controls to Atlanta had nothing to do with Saturday’s outage
Which is total BS. If you had ONE person who's responsibility was to ONE station (yours) I bet the feed would have been restored sooner. How soon did the Atlanta switcher notice the feed was gone on your station, Mr Totsch?
“With CBS,” he said, “I wouldn’t be surprised if this happens again.”
Oh that's really classy, Mr Totsch.
Moron. I bet this guy is just a dream to work for, too.
"It’s a phenomenon that even industry insiders struggle to explain."
No we don't. As others have stated here, it's twice a year that the sun, satellite and dish are all perfectly aligned. The sun overpowers the satellite signal with it's energy and you lose the signal for a few minutes. What's so hard to explain about that?
"“It was a rare occurrence."
No it's not. Happens twice a year.
Bobby Totsch, vice president and general manager of KCTV, said [...] that sunspots were a factor
I recommend to Mr Totsch that he stick to managing the station and stay out of the engineering department. Sunspots? Seriously?
He said KCTV has three satellite receivers: one primary and two backups.
That's great, unless all three receivers are looking at the same satellite you doof. Again, stay out of the engineering department, Mr Totsch. (on a side note, why can they not get the chief engineer to make these statements. You know, someone who has a clue?)
Totsch said the decision to outsource the station’s master controls to Atlanta had nothing to do with Saturday’s outage
Which is total BS. If you had ONE person who's responsibility was to ONE station (yours) I bet the feed would have been restored sooner. How soon did the Atlanta switcher notice the feed was gone on your station, Mr Totsch?
“With CBS,” he said, “I wouldn’t be surprised if this happens again.”
Oh that's really classy, Mr Totsch.
Moron. I bet this guy is just a dream to work for, too.
Nick said:
Considering the fact that the sun, the satellite and the dish is perfectly aligned, shouldn't they be receiving the interference at the same time? The only time there are time variances is how further north or south a city is -- as St. Louis, Kansas City and Topeka are close to the same latitude, the time differences are actually negligible.
Bengalsfan said:
Has anyone here had the guts to e-mail or write a letter to Totsch? It pains me to see that we here know much more about how TV stations and satellites work than he does. Heck, even I knew about the sun transit phenomenon ever since the days of watching cable in the 1980s.
If you want to run a TV station, you have to know how it works -- if all you know about TV is programming, advertising and budgets, you don't belong in the business.
azumanga said:
There may be a very slight difference on when each station sees the outage start since the location of the TVRO dish is different. And in reality, Kansas City would see the outage first. Think about where the TVRO dish is, the satellite location and the direction the sun travels. The dish in KC is aimed further eastward than the dish in St. Louis.
azumanga said:
Not nessessarly....if you have good people around you. I'd bet a week's pay this doof didn't talk to his engineer before giving the statement to the press.
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