UK STB sends out SOS
By Evan Blass 
posted Jan 15th 2006 2:00PM
posted Jan 15th 2006 2:00PM
A digital settop box in the UK recently pulled off
a feat that is said to have odds of "far more than 14 million-to-one" when it somehow broadcast an SOS
distress signal on the very channel that the Royal Airforce uses for emergencies at sea. A Moray-based helicopter spent
two hours searching the Portsmouth Harbour area for the supposed "distressed vessel" before ground-based techs
at telecom regulator Ofcom were able to trace the signal to a malfunctioning Freeview box located on dry land. Thankfully for the owner of the
box, it sent out a mayday as opposed to broadcasting the international signal for "step up, yo," in which case
he/she may have ended up suffering the full wrath of the British war machine.[Thanks, Tom]
I think this actually happened once before, a few months ago, in the USA. It was an old Toshiba Television that did it.
Just did a quick google search, here is a link to the story:
Sorry, here is the link:
http://www.gazettetimes.com/articles/2004/10/17/news/top_story/gtsun01.txt
I live in Portsmouth!
Shame I wasn't around when it happend though... Knowing the people around here though it probably wasn't intentional :-p
A little competition is not bad, space must be open for everyone...
Hey Solar - I'm up in Moray. We should have a Engadget UK meetup one day!
I'm in Portsmouth (UK) too! Knowing the people I know I would guess it WAS deliberate! Nice to see my little town in international news... :)
This has happened twice before in the United States within the past year or so. One was in Oregon which had an article done on it as John S. mentioned, and another much less known case in Miami, Florida. Both cases were due to a Toshiba television gone mad (receiver turned transceiver) sending out an odd signal on 121.5Mhz. I'm curious to know what television the homeowner had. Was it really the freeview box or another Toshiba?