It is time once again for a technical phenomenon called “sun outages”. For a period of about 7 days, starting approximately March 1st, the sun will cause “solar interference” to all geostationary satellite signals. As the sun’s path across the sky gets lower each day, there are times when it is in a direct line behind a communication satellite that is sending signals to our receiving satellite dish here on earth (at the Headend). When the dish antenna is looking into the sun, the interference from the sun overrides the signals from the satellite. This is when a sun outage occurs.
Sun outages can last as long as 10 minutes per channel. The effects of sun outages vary in degree from minimal to total outage throughout the 7 day period. Once it reaches its peak the interference will gradually decrease becoming less noticeable each day after. The rolling outages will start at approximately 1:00 PM EST each day and should be over by approximately 6:00 p.m. EST.
This will affect all channels except for some of our local off air stations (NBC, CBS, etc.).
Here is a description on what to expect when viewing any digital services through our STB’s:
When the digital signals are interrupted by the sun’s energy, the set top converter displays “One Moment Please” on the affected channel(s). This condition will be present for several minutes each day during the sun outage period.
FYI on our Comcast HITS Programming that we use:
Because we receive some of the programming via the HITS lineup on satellite, some HITS programming services could be lost twice during this period as HITS experiences receive outages on their end in Colorado.
These sun outages do not affect cable modem services.
Remember even if the sun is not shining here on earth it is still up there.
