BBC Television Centre

BBC Television Centre (sometimes abbreviated TVC or TC) in London is home to the vast majority of BBC television output and, since 1998, almost all of the corporation's national TV and radio news output by BBC News.

History

On March 3 2001, a terrorist bomb located in a taxi exploded in front of Television Centre. 11 people were seriously injured in the blast. The attack was attributed to dissident Irish Republican terrorists. It was speculated at the time that the Panorama programme which named those suspected of involvement in the Omagh bombing was the motive for the attack.

Related Topics:
March 3 - 2001 - Panorama - Omagh bombing

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Television Centre has suffered recently from power cuts, which due to the varied reasons are not seen as a systemic problem. On 20 June 2000 a power cut across West London forced many services off air, including the main network evening news. On 30 June 2001 powercuts again caused major breaks in output across all BBC services, with the added complication that a fire in backup generators caused the evacuation of the building.

Related Topics:
20 June - 2000 - 30 June - 2001

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Just before 0800 GMT on 28 November 2003 an electrical fault caused some equipment to overheat which set off fire alarms. Although there was no fire the fault did cause widespread power cuts and prevented backup generators from providing alternative power. Again all output was affected with services transferred across London to alternative studios. For example, both the One O'Clock News and BBC News 24 broadcast for much of the day from the BBC's Millbank studios, and the morning radio shows the Today programme and Five Live's Breakfast fell off air for 15 minutes.

Related Topics:
28 November - 2003 - BBC News 24 - Millbank - Today - Five Live's

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This power cut came on the week prior to the relaunch of News 24, which was postponed for another week to ensure that all problems had been remedied.

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In the long term, the future of Television Centre as a BBC building is in question; Playout and transmission operations were moved out of the building in 2004 and 2005 to the new BBC Broadcast Centre at White City, News operations are due to move out in 2008 to Broadcasting House, Children's BBC and BBC Sport staff are expected to move to Manchester around 2010, and large numbers of office staff are expected to move to the new Media Village. As the studios are increasingly under-utilised it is quite possible that in 20 years time the BBC will have much less use for one of its most distinctive sites.

Related Topics:
2005 - 2008

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