A major technical issue at BBC News forced the channel to revert to recorded programming.

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Viewers quickly spotted the fact that the BBC's Afternoon Live programme was showing recorded news reports from earlier in the day instead than live broadcasts.

A statement from the BBC confirmed that a technical issue had forced the channel off air on the afternoon of Wednesday 10th October 2018, although the BBC News website was still operating normally.

The problem was said to be with the BBC's new newsroom computer system OpenMedia, with an internal memo explaining that the "system remains unavailable to most staff".

The channel returned to broadcasting live from around 4pm, after showing recorded news since at least 3pm.

News broadcaster Ben Brown said that the problem had been as a result of "just a few computer glitches which we’re trying to sort out, so do bear with us".

A statement from the BBC confirmed just after 3.30pm that there was a problem. "Due to a technical issue we're currently running recorded programming on our live news channels," the statement said. "We're working hard to resolve this as quickly as possible. The BBC News website is operating normally."

The fault was first noticed by viewers at around 3pm on Wednesday afternoon. However, the live programming had returned in time for the 4 o'clock headlines.

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The BBC confirmed at 4.04pm that its news channels were "back on air".

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