BBC One’s flagship Sunday political programme was 10 minutes late going on air due to technical problems.
The Andrew Marr Show, which was being hosted by Mishal Husain, went on air at 0910, 10 minutes later than planned.
But problems continued as journalist Chris Mason was forced to abandon reading the news headlines minutes after the show began due to the “gremlins”.
If you're looking for #marr on BBC One, we haven't been able to come on air due to technical issues. We're working to resolve them and hope to be on as soon as possible.
— BBC Politics (@BBCPolitics) April 28, 2019
Mr Mason read the lead news story, about Natascha Engel quitting as the Government’s fracking tsar, but was forced to give up.
After a brief pause he said: “I’m afraid, Mishal, I’m not seeing any more of this news bulletin. These gremlins, I’m afraid, are continuing and I’ll have to hand back to you.”
Ms Husain said: “We do have a few technical problems this morning, so apologies for that. We have come on air on BBC One a little bit later than we had hoped to.”
Mr Mason later revealed he had “ad libbed around the top story” because he had no paper copy of the bulletin.
‘Twas one of those moments. The tech glitches meant I didn’t have a paper copy of the bulletin…the autocue worked delightfully in rehearsal…but decided to freeze on the air. So I ad libbed around the top story, but didn’t think it wise to ad lib any further… #marr https://t.co/f72AB1sHJV
— Chris Mason (@ChrisMasonBBC) April 28, 2019
He said on Twitter: “The tech glitches meant I didn’t have a paper copy of the bulletin … the autocue worked delightfully in rehearsal … but decided to freeze on the air. So I ad libbed around the top story, but didn’t think it wise to ad lib any further.”
