Breaking News Interruption / Live-Action TV

• CBS famously interrupted As the World Turns in the Eastern and Central time zones to report on the shooting and eventual death of President John F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963. (A repeat of the sitcom The Real McCoys was interrupted in the west.)
  • CBS was the only TV network on the air at the time; NBC and ABC affiliates were in the midst of local or syndicated programming when the news broke, although some ABC affiliates were airing a rerun of Father Knows Best (perhaps the reason why CBS is the only U.S. TV network for which the moment of the first bulletin has been preserved on video for posterity, as the extant NBC and ABC network coverage begins after the first bulletin had already been aired).
  • One of the most famous instances of a bulletin interruption on a local station occurred in Dallas itself on WFAA-TV, an ABC affiliate that was airing a local lifestyle/talk show at the moment. Jay Watson, the station's program director and a witness to the shooting, having run three or four blocks from Dealey Plaza to the WFAA studios on Young St., suddenly appeared onscreen during a discussion about winter coats and informed the audience, "A tragic thing, from all indications at this point, has happened in the city of Dallas..."
  • BBC also famously delayed the airing of the very first episode of Doctor Who on November 23, 1963 for Kennedy assassination news coverage. This is popularly believed to have influenced the episode's initially poor ratings, remedied by the BBC re-airing the episode a week later.^note Kennedy's assassination was, in truth, a secondary reason for the rebroadcast — blackouts across significant parts of Great Britain that day meant that few people could have watched the BBC in any event. The first broadcast was only delayed some 90 seconds due to a bulletin about the aftermath of the assassination. This event was later referenced as a Mythology Gag in first episode of the show's 2005 revival and dramatized in the show's 50th anniversary docudrama An Adventure in Space and Time.
  • An inversion would occur on February 15, 2019, when CBS decided to "interrupt" President Trump's speech about border security and go back to regular programming, which was The Price Is Right. CNN's Brian Stelter found it humorous and began live-tweeting the "action" happening on the game show. He even would draw the ire of fans with confusing the Showcase ^note The last part of the show where two contestants make a single bid on a showcase of prizes with the Showcase Showdown^note The part where the Contestants spin the wheel.
• During the series's original run, the final episode of My Mother the Car was interrupted by a special news bulletin involving NASA. The episode did not resume afterwards, and it wouldn't be until later that the entire episode was seen.
• On June 4, 1968, the initial bulletins about another Kennedy's assassination interrupted a TV network's closedown and forced the network to stay on the air. That network, ABC, was in the midst of signing off its coverage of the California Presidential Primary, which Senator Robert F. Kennedy - John's brother - was projected to win. Instead of going dark, however, the network continued to display a shot of the news set while a John Philip Sousa march played through twice and an announcer intoned, "Please stay tuned for a special report." After the music stopped, news anchor Howard K. Smith appeared on screen again and informed the viewers that Senator Kennedy had been shot, and the continuous coverage began.
• "Turnabout Intruder", the last episode of Star Trek: The Original Series, was pre-empted by the death of Dwight D. Eisenhower. It didn't air until two months later.
• The NBC network premiere of the 1976 version of King Kong on September 17, 1978 (along with ABC and CBS programming) was interrupted by a happier example than most of the examples listed; namely the Camp David Accords that set the stage for the following March's formal peace treaty between Egypt and Israel.
• During a live broadcast of ABC's Monday Night Football in 1980, John Lennon's assassination was announced on-air by commentator Howard Cosell. (This was dramatized in the 2016 film The Lennon Report, showing how Cosell got the news and decided it had to be announced live during the game.)
  • Meanwhile over at NBC, The Tonight Show was broken into to announce Lennon's death.
• The premiere of the Disney special One Man's Dream on December 12, 1981 on CBS was interrupted for a Special Report about Poland's declaration of martial law.
• The 1986 destruction of the Space Shuttle Challenger was broken in the UK by Newsround, a Lighter and Softer newscast broadcast during CBBC. This was down to timing more than anything else, but it was probably a shock to everyone anyway (and immediately after Newsround, coverage began from the usual BBC News team). Mood Whiplash occurred as then-CBBC presenter Philip Schofield suddenly went from his usual cheery demeanor to subdued (since he was actually involved in controlling the output the viewers saw in the Broom Cupboard, he was probably trying to process what he was seeing).
• The December 20, 1989 episode of One Life to Live was interrupted by the news that the United States had invaded Panama. Fans of the series now consider it a Missing Episode as no full copy of it has surfaced as of this edit. The next day's episode also got interrputed near the end to cover a press conference President George H. W. Bush held about the invasion. However, some ABC stations opted to wait for the episode to conclude before preempting General Hospital to cover the press conference, so that episode is available in its entirety.
• On New Years Day 1986, NBC interrupted the Rose Parade's broadcast to air Soviet General Secretary Gorbachev's New Years Day message to the American public, which was apart of an exchanging of televised greetings between the United States and Soviet Union.
• The short-lived game show Bargain Hunters faced constant pre-emptions from news coverage of the Iran-Contra hearings for half of its' run.
• The 1986 Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade was interrupted before the appearance of the Garfield balloon for a message from Ronald Reagan.
  • The 2003 Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade had its West Coast broadcast interrupted by NBC, to report that President George W. Bush made a surprise Thanksgiving Day visit to U.S. troops in Iraq.
• In 2015, after an encore showing of the 2015 National Dog Show, NBC News went immediately into a special report on a mass shooting at a Colorado Springs Planned Parenthood Clinic.
• The original broadcast of Episode 1.7 of Rescue 911 was interrupted in some portions for CBS News coverage of the Loma Prieta Earthquake. A rerun was scheduled for December 5, 1989.
  • ABC was broadcasting the baseball World Series, live from San Francisco's Candlestick Park, when the quake hit. An aircheck from San Francisco's KGO-TV, showing the moment the quake struck and 45 minutes of the station's subsequent local coverage, exists on YouTube.
• An August 30, 1997 ABC airing of the series finale of Hangin' with Mr. Cooper was interrupted on the West Coast by a bulletin announcing Princess Diana's death.
  • The next day, across the Pond, the ITV Chart Show was interrupted midway through a broadcast of the music video for Catch's "Bingo" to allow ITN to announce the death of Diana, Princess of Wales.
• An odd example happened during the Seinfeld finale that crosses over with No-Hoper Repeat: Cable network TV Land suspended their programming for an hour to show this image◊ encouraging viewers to switch the channel to Seinfeld.
• General Hospital:
  • On July 11, 1985, General Hospital was interrupted when Coca-Cola reintroduced their classic formula following the New Coke fiasco.
  • During the Columbine shootings in 1999, a General Hospital episode was interrupted for an ABC News Special Report.
  • On February 23, 2021, KABC in Los Angeles pushed General Hospital to 2 AM due to breaking news coverage on a vehicle accident involving Tiger Woods.
• On September 11, 2001, the Italian state TV channel Rai 3 interrupted an episode of the children's program Melevisione to cover the terrorist attacks in New York City that day. The event confused children across the country and became a defining generational moment for Italian Gen Zers, to the point it warranted a mention in the Pinguini Tattici Nucleari song "Scrivile Scemo".
• Another example of ABC Daytime getting interrupted - an All My Children airing was interrupted for news on Bill Clinton's surgery.
• The live broadcast of Quatermass 2005 in the United Kingdom had an on-screen graphic displayed twice, advising viewers that a major news story (the death of Pope John Paul II) was being covered on BBC News 24.
• On December 29, 2006 CBS News interrupted local programming on the East Coast to announce that Saddam Hussein had been executed.
  • Similarly, ABC News interrupted 20/20 to announce Hussein's execution.
• In series 38, episode 7 of British quiz show Have I Got News for You, a crew member walked up to Ian Hislop and whispered in his ear. Ian then announced that cabinet minister James Purnell had just resigned, just as the panel were discussing the various cabinet resignations that had occurred during that week.
  • News that Ed Miliband was resigning as Leader of the Labour Party similarly interrupted another episode. A week later, discussion of Chuka Umunna, who was one of the candidates to be Miliband's replacement, was interrupted by the news that Umunna was dropping out of the race.
• An ESPN Sunday Night Baseball telecast in 2011 was interrupted for an announcement of the death of Osama bin Laden.
  • NBC's broadcast of an episode of the fourth season of The Celebrity Apprentice was disrupted for the same reason.
• On October 5, 2011, the "Rebranding" episode of Hank Azaria's short-lived sitcom Free Agents was interrupted to announce the death of Steve Jobs.
• On December 5, 2011, the annual Sinterklaas of Sesamstraat was spontaneously cancelled because the live broadcast of a political debate took longer than expected. The network, not wanting to suddenly stop the debate, decided to cancel the Sinterklaas episode at the last minute, which was originally scheduled to start after the debate. All the while millions of parents and children were waiting in front of their televisions for said episode to begin, in vain. This decision caused national outrage, with many angry Dutchmen, including several Dutch celebrities, voicing their displeasure on Twitter. The chief editor of Sesamstraat told local newspapers the cast and crew were absolutely livid by this decision, as the Sinterklaas episode takes up a lot of time and money to film, which was now flushed down the drain.
• Survivor has been interrupted for breaking news during a season finale twice:
  • The finale of Survivor: Philippines on December 16th, 2012 was delayed by coverage of the Sandy Hook shooting.
  • The finale of Survivor: Island of the Idols on December 18th, 2019 was interrupted to announce that President Trump had been impeached. Norah O'Donnell began the announcement by attempting to reassure Survivor viewers that they would not miss a minute of it.
  • On many stations that night's local airing of Wheel of Fortune, Jeopardy!, or Entertainment Tonight got preempted by the actual impeachment vote which began at 7:30.
    • Meanwhile, ABC interrupted the beginning of the Good Times half of the second edition of Live In Front Of A Studio Audience to announce the news. Jimmy Kimmel even lampshaded the possibility of this happening in the speech he gave at the beginning of the broadcast.shooting.
• On August 31, 2013, an airing of a Premier League match on NBC was interrupted for an NBC News Special Report on Syria.
• The second-to-last episode of the Japanese series Ressha Sentai ToQger was interrupted by a newscast about the death of a Japanese journalist at the hands of the terrorist group ISIS. It was long enough to push the final two episodes (and thus, the premiere of Shuriken Sentai Ninninger) back, but short enough that Kamen Rider Drive and the premiere of Go! Princess Pretty Cure aired uninterrupted.
• Just after midnight on June 4, 2016, the late-night shows across the big three American networks (''The Late Show with Stephen Colbert'' on CBS, ''Jimmy Kimmel Live!'' on ABC, and ''The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon'' on NBC) were interrupted with a special report on the death of Muhammad Ali.
  • Four years later, many late-night shows across America such as Colbert and Kimmel were interrupted with a special report on the death of civil-rights leader John Lewis either in the late hours of July 17 or the early hours of July 18, 2020.
    • The last few minutes of the July 30 broadcast of Let's Make a Deal, as well as the end of the final hour of Today on NBC ^note ABC and FOX were airing local programming, so what got interrupted depended on the affiliate, were interrupted for coverage of the funeral of John Lewis.
• When North Korea launched a missile over Hokkaido, the morning news program of TV Tokyo, News Morning Satelite, was given an additional half-hour of airtime to cover this topic. This lead to the first pre-emption of Oha Suta, the children's news program that followed, in its 20-year-run to not be related to sports coverage. As a result of this incident, the rerun of Kemono Friends that came on afterwards ran with no advertising.
• The Price Is Right didn't have such a lucky premiere of its 44th season as the show's themed "Decades Week" faced an interruption on most days caused by the visit of Pope Francis in the United States. On September 23 the show was interrupted during the fifth Item Up For Bids for a Special Report and returned during the sixth pricing game. On September 24, the show was interrupted at the first Showcase Showdown for a special report on the Pope's speech, that episode never returning to the air on the East Coast. The last day of Decades Week was the least lucky, with the entire latter half of the show being interrupted on the East Coast for a third Special Report on the Pope (preempting the premiere of the game Vend-O-Price), once again with the show not returning to the air, and then subsequently being interrupted on the West Coast by a Special Report on the resignation of Speaker of the House John Boehner.
• The June 18, 2018, airing of Okaasan to Issho was cut off after the hosts asked the viewers at home "Minna genki?" ^note  "How is everyone doing today?" for coverage of an earthquake in Osaka. This in turn wound up pre-empting Inai Inai Baa!, the show that followed.
  • Similarly, on April 13, 2023, the show was interrupted during the Fantane! segment by news of a missle being fired over Hokkaido. Like the previous example, it wound up pre-empting Inai Inai Baa!.
• On March 22, 2019 ABC interrupted the first network broadcast of the Overwatch League to announce that the Bob Mueller Special Counsel Investigation into the 2016 election had completed.
• On April 15, 2019, the last few minutes of a repeat of The View were interrupted for an ABC News Special Report on the Notre Dame cathedral fire.
  • Similarly, a broadcast of The View on June 10, 2021, was interrupted in the middle of an interview for a report on President Joe Biden's trip to Europe.
• On January 3, 2020, a NBC Special Report about the death of Qasem Soleimani came on seven minutes into a repeat of the November 7, 2019 edition of The Ellen DeGeneres Show, which featured Steve Carell as a guest, on New York City affiliate WNBC. ABC also interrupted their programs for the same report during a new episode of General Hospital, as well as CBS (in New York, a repeat of the September 18, 2019 episode of Dr. Phil was on).
• Surprisingly averted for ABC's airing of the January 21, 2020 Senate Impeachment Trial. The show that aired in the slot the trial began, Strahan, Sara and Keke, did not advertise that the show would be airing that day via social media unlike what they did the day prior. However, this trope was played straight with NBC, as several affiliates had to reschedule Days of Our Lives to the graveyard slot due to the coverage.
  • Similarly during the impeachment trial, new episodes of The Price Is Right were cancelled by CBS for about two weeks during the trial because proceedings began every day at 11:30 which would have led to the later half of those new episodes getting pre-empted. At the same time the cast of The Young and the Restless and The Bold and the Beautiful used social media to inform viewers that new episode of those shows were cancelled because of the trial.
• The very start of the 2020 NFL Pro Bowl on January 26, 2020 was interrupted by an ABC News Special Report on Kobe Bryant's death.
• The second The ABC's of COVID-19 special on CNN was pre-empted at the last minute for coverage of protests related to the death of George Floyd. This was later changed into a town hall based on that event. Because of this, the second ABC's of COVID-19 special wound up airing on June 13, 2020.
• Several networks (the Big 4 broadcasts networks and PBS, which rarely uses this trope) suspended their programming at 2PM Eastern on June 4th, 2020 for a ceremony honoring George Floyd. This interrupted a new episode of Hero Elementary on some affiliates.
  • This was downplayed on the day of the actual funeral, as it began at the time most stations (at least in the Eastern time zone) would be playing newscasts. Unlike the memorial ceremony, PBS did not air the funeral.
• A WNBA game on ABC was interrupted with a special report about the death of legendary TV personality Regis Philbin on July 25, 2020.
  • An hour of Modern Family reruns, as well as reruns of Blackish and its' spinoff mixed-ish, were pre-empted on July 28 for two special episodes of 20/20: the first addressing Regis Philbin's passing and the second covering the COVID-19 pandemic.
    • Similarly, ABC pre-empted reruns of Celebrity Family Feud, Press Your Luck, and Match Game for an airing of Black Panther and an ABC News special on August 30th to honor Chadwick Boseman after his sudden passing.
    • In fact, Celebrity Family Feud got pre-empted nationwide no more than three times in the summer of 2020. Once on June 21 for an interview with former National Security Advisor John Bolton and once more on July 19 for an interview with Mary Trump. The third and final time happened on August 23 for an interview with Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden and vice-presidential candidate Kamala Harris.
    • Celebrity Family Feud wasn't immune to local preemptions in 2020, either. In one such example, on May 31, Detroit affiliate WXYZ interrupted the last several minutes of its season premiere for breaking news coverage of continuing protests in Detroit related to the death of George Floyd (after that city implemented a temporary curfew after protests on previous nights turned violent), which also interrupted the first few minutes of the season premiere of Press Your Luck.
    • Also similarly, ABC preempted a new episode of Card Sharks on November 8 for a special 20/20 episode on Alex Trebek's passing.
• When Typhoon Bavi was hitting North Korea in 2020, state-run Korean Central Television broadcasted overnight (it usually signs off around 10:30pm) and interrupted airings of films to give updates on the storm and its aftermath.
• On September 18, 2020, many, though not all, local airings of Jeopardy!, Wheel of Fortune, or Entertainment Tonight were interrupted for breaking news coverage of the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, which also pre-empted the programming which followed (for instance, on ABC, it interrupted a repeat of America's Funniest Home Videos).
• On Columbus Day of 2020, all broadcast stations except PBS in the United States pre-empted their morning programming for coverage of the hearing of Judge Amy Coney Barrett.
• On November 8th, 2020, WABC interupted Here and Now ^note  a local program about the African American community in New York City to announce the death of Alex Trebek. One minute into the announcement, it was interrupted by ABC News' national announcement of Trebek's death. 10 seconds later, WABC cut back to their own feed and continued broadcasting their own announcement.
  • For that matter on the night of November 8th, ABC preempted that night's episode of Card Sharks for a 20/20 special on the life of Alex Trebek, just as they had done earlier in the year for Regis Philbin, Chadwick Boseman, and Kobe Bryant.
• On December 21 and 22, 2020, General Hospital was interrupted for two different speeches by Joe Biden.
• WKRG Mobile, Alabama (and other eastern CBS affiliates) briefly interrupted the January 22, 2021, airing of The Price Is Right to announce the death of Mobile native and former Atlanta Braves player Hank Aaron.
  • WKRG would later interrupt the October 31, 2022 airing of The Young and the Restless at its very beginning to report on a standoff at the city's Government Plaza office building.
    • NBC affiliate WPMI also interrupted an airing of Tamron Hall to report this as well. Averted with FOX affiliate WALA as this incident occurred at the beginning of its midday news.
• The death of French rock legend Johnny Hallyday made several networks such as TF1, France 2, and W9 cease any normal broadcast and devote themselves 24/7 to the news.
• For a fascinating look at how Japan covers natural incidents on-air, see this NHK morning news broadcast from November 22, 2016, when the 2016 Tohoku Earthquake hit at close to 6 AM. The anchors didn't even have a chance to introduce their morning topics, as the earthquake coincided almost perfectly with the on-screen graphics showing up. Instead, they immediately switched to a stoic, authoritative demeanour and began giving information about the earthquake without skipping a beat!
• On January 6, 2021, all four major broadcast networks in the United States (plus PBS) interrupted their programming at around 2:30 PM EST to cover the storming of the United States Capitol. The interruption would continue for most of the day, preempting several primetime shows.
• On February 13, 2021, a music show on NHK that was covering the writing process of the theme song to the asadora (morning drama) Ochoyan had its' broadcast interrupted to announce that a magnitude 7.1 earthquake had struck Japan.
  • Meanwhile, over on Tokyo MX, a broadcast of Cells at Work! CODE BLACK opened with a breaking news banner about the earthquake. The banners lasted throughout a majority of the episode.
  • On TV Asahi, the sixth episode of the second season of World Trigger was pre-empted due to news coverage of the earthquake.
• On March 29, 2021, Let's Make a Deal, The Price Is Right and The View were all preempted on the East Coast by the opening statements in the murder trial of former police officer Derek Chauvin. Similarly, they along with all four daytime soaps and The Talk were preempted on April 19 by coverage of the closing arguments. Some or all of a few syndicated daytime shows including Dr. Phil, The Dr. Oz Show, Maury, Ellen, and The Real were also preempted.
  • Just one day following, local or syndicated programming was preempted by the announcement that a verdict had been reached in the case. Later that day, Wheel of Fortune, Jeopardy! and other syndicated shows were preempted by a pair of speeches from Joe Biden & Kamala Harris.
• At 1:38 PM on April 2, 2021, Good Morning America's third hour on ABC, as well as Days Of Our Lives on NBC, were interrupted for a news report on an incident at the U.S. Capitol. However, CBS didn't interrupt their programming until 2 PM, where their special report interrupted an episode of The Talk featuring an interview with Dr. Phil.
• At 12:05PM on April 9, 2021, the death of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh and husband of Queen Elizabeth II, was announced with coverage taking over the major TV channels in the UK, while others had messages directing viewers to the news channels. Notably, on ITV's This Morning, presenters Eamonn Holmes and Ruth Langsford stopped their interview with actor Alan Halsall (Tyrone Dobbs from Coronation Street) to make the news, also resulting in a cooking item with chef Ainsley Harriott, scheduled to close the day's show, being canceled.
  • In a related follow-up, Litton's educational programming on NBC, ABC, and CBS was preempted on Saturday April 17, 2021 by US coverage of Prince Phillip's funeral. That same day across the Pond, CBeebies interrupted an airing of CBeebies House for a minute of silence for the funeral of Prince Phillip.
  • Meanwhile, in Australia, The ABC interrupted an episode of Vera for the news that Prince Phillip had died. This resulted in a large amount of complaints being sent to the network over this incident.
• The June 16, 2021 broadcast of The Young and the Restless was interrupted during the last 13 minutes for a special report on the summit between President Biden and Vladimir Putin. ABC and NBC also interrupted their programs for coverage of this same event, with ABC interrupting their afternoon news program GMA 3: What You Need To Know and NBC interrupting local programming.
• The June 17, 2021, broadcast of General Hospital was interrupted for news coverage of President Biden signing a bill that would make Juneteenth a national holiday in the United States.
• On June 25, 2021, the first half of General Hospital and The Talk were preempted by coverage of former police officer Derek Chauvin's sentencing for the murder of George Floyd.
• The afternoon of June 30, 2021, had two breaking news stories happening around the same time: the death of former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, and the release of Bill Cosby from prison. This resulted in a situation where two channels (NBC and ABC) were running special reports on two different stories (Rumsfeld and Cosby, respectively), with NBC later switching to the report on Cosby after ending their report on Rumsfeld.
• On July 1, 2021, the latter half of Days of Our Lives as well as the first half of syndicated programming on NBC and the first half of General Hospital on ABC were interrupted by the breaking news that Donald Trump's former company had been criminally charged with tax crimes in New York City.
• On July 4, 2021, the Semifinals of the College Bowl on NBC and a rerun of America's Funniest Home Videos on ABC were interrupted by Joe Biden giving a live Independence Day address and declaring the end of the COVID-19 emergency in the United States.
• On July 20, 2021, programming on all broadcast networks (with the exception of PBS) was pre-empted for coverage of Jeff Bezos' space mission.
• On July 27th, 2021, syndicated programming on ABC and CBS was pre-empted for news coverage of a congressional hearing related to the January 6 storming of the U.S. Capitol. Four police officers who'd defended the building^note Daniel Hodges, Michael Fanone, Harry Dunn, Aquilino Gonell related the events, with Heroic BSoD.
• On August 15, 2021, ABC's broadcast of a new episode of The Chase was preempted by a special on the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan. After the half-hour special, ABC joined a rerun of The Chase and preempted To Tell the Truth with a rerun of The Conners.
  • The following day, syndicated programming on affiliates of all four major networks was interrupted by Joe Biden giving an address on the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan and his decision to withdraw America's troops and end the 20-year conflict.
• On September 21, 2021, all broadcast stations except for PBS interrupted programming for President Biden's address of the UN General Assembly.
• On November 3, 2021, NBC interrupted syndicated programming for Joe Biden's speech on the COVID vaccine being approved for children and for the recent election of a Republican governor in Virginia.
  • Similarly, NBC interrupted syndicated programming on November 15 for coverage of Biden's signing of the infrastructure bill.
• Telemundo and Univision interrupted their programming on December 12, 2021, to announce the death of Mexican singer and actor Vicente Fernández. His death coincided with that year's Miss Universe, so Telemundo ended their interruption early for that event, while Univision continued airing coverage of his funeral.
• ABC and NBC both interrupted syndicated programming during a commercial break on the East Coast to air a special report on the death of Betty White on December 31, 2021. On the West Coast, a new episode of Days of Our Lives was interrupted for the news.
• On January 9, 2022, ABC News fittingly broke into America's Funniest Home Videos to announce the death of its first host, comedian Bob Saget.
• On January 19, 2022 NBC broke into syndicated programming to carry a news conference with Joe Biden.
• On January 26, 2022 CBS interrupted The Young and the Restless and NBC stations interrupted syndicated programming to announce the retirement of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Stephen Bryer.
• On February 15, 2022, all three networks interrupted regular programming with CBS interrupting The Talk and NBC and ABC interrupting syndicated programming as President Joe Biden gave an address on the situation of unrest at the Ukraine border. One week later on February 22 it would happen again. One day later on February 23, all three networks interrupted a third time when Biden announced new political sanctions on Russia.
• The 2022 Ukraine/Russia crisis caused a fourth interruption on March 8, 2022 when all three networks interrupted programming for coverage of Biden's address announcing a US ban on Russian oil imports, leading CBS to interrupt The Price Is Right and ABC to interrupt The View.
• The 5th Russia/Ukraine related interruption happened on March 16, 2022 when CBS interrupted The Young and the Restless for Joe Biden's speech on a new financial aid program for Ukraine.
• The selection and swearing in of US Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson caused programming interruptions on several occasions. Programming was interrupted by all of the networks on April 4, 2022 by coverage of the Senate procedural vote, on April 7 by coverage of the final confirmation vote, and on April 8th by coverage of her swearing in ceremony.
• On April 11, 2022 three of the networks interrupted syndicated afternoon programming for coverage of Joe Biden's speech on a new gun control executive order. The day after that, shows such as The View and The Price Is Right were interrupted for a special report on a shooting in a New York subway station.
• On May 14, 2022 the three main networks interrupted sports and local infomercials to report on a mass shooting at a Buffalo supermarket. Three days later, CBS interrupted The Young and the Restless when President Joe Biden gave a speech in response to the tragedy.
• On May 24, 2022 the three main networks interrupted syndicated programming for a breaking news report on a school shooting in Uvalde, Texas. In many markets, this interrupted the series finale of The Ellen DeGeneres Show. That night, an address by Joe Biden would interrupt a rerun of FBI, as well as that night's new episodes of Young Rock, Holey Moley, and Name That Tune. A week later on June 2, a second speech would interrupt syndicated programming including Wheel of Fortune, Jeopardy!, and Entertainment Tonight.
  • On May 26, 2022, after the premiere showing of the series finale of The Ellen DeGeneres Show, the credits was pushed back as NBC immediately began their special report regarding updates of the Uvalde, Texas school shooting.
• On November 18, 2022 NBC and ABC interrupted syndicated programming and infomercials and CBS interrupted The Talk for breaking news on Attorney General Merrick Garland opening a special counsel into Donald Trump.
• Queen Elizabeth's death on September 8, 2022 caused this trope to occur on multiple TV channels:
  • The BBC suspended their programming during an episode of Bargain Hunt for updates on the Queen's health. Averted during the actual announcement of the death at 18.30pm BST, which occurred during a news program, making it a This Just In! situation, however that news program had been put on in place of regular programming since mid afternoon, which was the first clue to the British public that this was more serious than a health scare, especially when ITV, Channel Four, and Channel 5 did exactly the same thing. Other BBC channels that took BBC 1's feed broke in once the actual announcement of The Queen's death was made on BBC One. CBBC, BBC Two and BBC Wales were the outliers, with CBBC completing its broadcast of Blue Peter, making a brief announcement that a special version of CBBC's in-house news program, Newsround was going to be coming up, playing an ad for Shaun the Sheep, and then announcing to the audience that The Queen had died. BBC Two was broadcasting a track-and-field event and waited for the current race to finish before joining BBC One's coverage. BBC Wales, much like CBBC, waited for their regular show to finish before starting up Welsh-language coverage. Notably, whereas the other channels all replaced their broadcasting for the day to cover the breaking news, CBBC opted to take a 'safe harbour approach' similar to some children's television channels in the USA during 9/11, and returned to their normal programming after concluding the Newsround broadcast, likely so that its younger audience had somewhere to go to avoid being overwhelmed.
  • CBC interrupted the Escape to the Country episode "Lincolnshire" to report on Queen Elizabeth's passing.
  • Across the pond in the US, the news of the Queen's death interrupted syndicated programming on NBC and Fox, while a new episode of The Bold and the Beautiful was interrupted for the news on CBS.
  • On September 19, 2022 all US networks would spend the day covering the Queen's funeral. Coverage began at 5:30 in the morning and wrapped up at noon with NBC, ABC, and CBS all preempting morning news and talk shows and Fox preempting local morning news shows and local and syndicated shows. CBS would take heat for ending their coverage at 10:00 for the season premieres of Let's Make a Deal and The Price Is Right.
• On the night of November 22, 2022 the late-night comedy shows on NBC, ABC, and CBS were interrupted for a breaking news report on a shooting at a Virginia Walmart store.
• The final episode of Days of Our Lives before the show's Channel Hop to Peacock was interrupted to broadcast a pre-recorded message regarding the funeral of Elizabeth II on the East Coast broadcast, although the West Coast broadcast would continue uninterrupted.
• The August 12, 1985 airing of the Nippon Television show The Top Ten featured a unique example - the show would briefly pause every few minutes for updates on the Japan Air Lines Flight 123 situation.
• On December 9th 2013, an airing of a Mrs. Brown's Boys Christmas special on BBC One was interrupted to give an announcement on the death of Nelson Mandela.
• On January 15, 2009, CW affiliate WPIX interrupted an airing of Judge Jeanine Piro to give one of the first reports on the crash of US Airways Flight 1549 into the Hudson River.
• On May 27th, 2019, Dayton, Ohio Fox affiliate WKEF interrupted an airing of the The Bachelorette for an ongoing tornado outbreak. When fans lambasted the meteorologist on their social media feed, he went off on them live on air for having Skewed Priorities.
• On April 1st, 2005, Polsat interrupted an airing of the Argentine telenovella Muñeca Brava for a news report on Pope John Paul II's health worsening.
• On September 11th, 2001, TVN had to interrupt a Brazillian telenovella for footage of the 9/11 attacks.
• On August 27, 2000, RTR ^note  now known as Rossiya-1 interrupted its coverage of Formula 1 Belgian Grand Prix for two newsflashes on Ostankino TV tower fire.
• On January 1, 2024, a major magntiude 7.6 earthquake hit Japan, interrupting many programs:
  • NHK had it happen during a soccer game, while their E-Tele subchannel's interruption involved a Go tournament.
  • The warning came on Nippon TV during an ad for company Abaman Shop. However, the New Year's special they were showing continued on as normal for a few minutes until the tsunami warning was issued.
  • TBS was showing a restaurant review segment when the warning was issued.
  • Fuji TV was showing a restaurant review (not related to TBS's one) at the time their programming was suspended.
  • TV Asahi was running a segment about covers of hit songs (specifically, Yumi Matsutoya's "Rouge No Dengon") when the news of the tsunami broke out.
  • In a surprising aversion to how they usually handle breaking news, TV Tokyo suspended their programming for the first time since the Tohoku earthquake in 2011 to report on the tsunami.
  • Tokyo MX was running a marathon of Zatch Bell!, with the warning occuring after the eyecatch of one episode. While it wasn't interrupted immediately, there was a brief tsunami news interruption shortly after the theme song of the following episode, which was immediately resumed to in progress.
• On February 5, 2024, news of King Charles' cancer diagnosis interrupted the start of a rerun of the Dateline episode "Unchecked Evil" on NBC.
• On April 11, 2024, CBS, NBC and ABC interrupted their programming around 10:55AM EST to break the news of OJ Simpson's death.

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