Porn interrupts Super Bowl broadcast in Tucson
By Alex Dalenberg
Arizona Daily Star
Tucsonans watching the Super Bowl got more action than they bargained for when a short clip from an adult movie channel interrupted Comcast's feed with full male nudity during the final moments of the game.
Officials at Comcast said about 30 seconds from Club Jenna, an adult cable television channel, were shown on the local Super Bowl telecast. The company was still working Sunday night to figure out how it happened.
Comcast had "no idea" at the time it happened how the porn may have gotten into its feed, said Kelle Maslyn, a company spokeswoman.
The Star newsroom was flooded with calls from irate viewers who said that the porn cut into the game with less than three minutes left to play, just after Arizona Cardinals player Larry Fitzgerald scored on a touchdown pass from Kurt Warner to put the team in the lead.
Callers said that the clip showed a woman unzipping a man's pants, followed by a graphic act between the two.
"I just figured it was another commercial until I looked up," said Cora King of Marana. "Then he did his little dance with everything hanging out."
Jeanene Piek said she was outraged that her granddaughter had seen the clip.
"I was in a state of shock. I am totally disgusted," she said.
The Super Bowl was being shown locally on KVOA. The station sends its signal to Comcast through a fiber line, said KVOA News Director Kathleen Choal.
KVOA's signal didn't have porn on it when the station sent it over to Comcast, station president Gary Nielsen said.
The company will continue to investigate what happened to its signal, Nielsen said.
Engineers at Comcast will be working throughout the night to determine what happened, Maslyn said.
The porn broke into the standard-definition feed reaching analog TV sets. It appears the porn only reached homes in the Tucson area, but Comcast did not know exactly how many homes were affected, Maslyn said.
Comcast's high-definition feed was not affected. Maslyn did not know how many homes were affected.
Comcast is the second-largest cable-television provider in Southern Arizona and serves more than 80,000 customers in unincorporated Pima County, Marana and Oro Valley.
Comcast has set up an e-mail account to take feedback from concerned customers.
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