Tuesday, February 21, 2012

Changes to BBC satellite services on 24 Feb 2012

Satellite operator SES Astra is making a number of changes to its fleet of satellites at the 28.2° East orbital position, serving the UK and Ireland, over the next few years. The first of these changes will take place during February when the Astra 1N satellite, which was launched last summer, replaces the Astra 2D satellite, which is coming towards the end of its life.

The BBC currently broadcasts many of its television and radio services on Astra 2D, so as part of this replacement process BBC services that are currently located on Astra 2D will be moved across to Astra 1N. The services affected are:
  • BBC One (including all National and Regional variants)
  • BBC One HD
  • BBC Two (including all National variants)
  • BBC Three
  • BBC Four
  • BBC HD
  • CBeebies
  • CBBC
  • BBC News
  • BBC Parliament
  • BBC ALBA
  • BBC Radio 5 Live
  • BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra
The migration will be taking place during the early hours of the morning on Friday 24 February, between approximately 03:00 and 05:00 UTC. If you are watching or listening to BBC channels via satellite during this time you may experience some intermittent disruption to service. PVR recordings of BBC programmes made during this time may also be disrupted.

The tuning details used for BBC services on Astra 1N following the migration will be the same as those used today for services on Astra 2D. The signal strength of the new satellite will also be the same or possibly better in some parts of the country. This means that the change of satellites should be invisible to most viewers.

(Source: Alix Pryde, Director of BBC Distribution via About The BBC blog via Media Network Weblog)

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