dan

It's 21 years ago today that Channel 5 aired episode 2841, beginning their run of the show, although they did air a Home and Away Special on Sunday 15th July 2001 as an introduction.

I'm just going to add here that I wasn't originally convinced that there could have been a xmas day broadcast of H&A in 1989, so after trying youtube for Xmas 89 continuity clips from ITV, I sought out my original off-air recording of the film "The BFG" that immediately preceded it, which was due originally to start at 3:15, then at some point near Xmas this was changed to 3:10 (perhaps HM The Queen, on at 3, was short of material that year?). Unfortunately my dad, who made the recording for me in the first place (I was 6!) was, on that day, super efficient at starting and ending the recording with the first and last frames of the film's credits, and the three ad breaks, though he left them in, did not contain any continuity indicating what the schedule was that day, but at least I had a bit of a nostalgia fest re-watching a classic animated film. Having given up on finding some proof I then stumbled on this clip on youtube, which if paused quickly enough right at the end, reveals that indeed H&A was aired on Xmas Day 1989 at 4:55pm

I will see what I can find for 1995 viewing figures, but by that point my source was only publishing a listing occasionally, and only including the highest viewed episode for any particular show that aired more than once in a week, so there's only limited information I can get. In terms of the researching of airdates, I've just tallied the airdates on the episodes section of this site with my spreadsheet compiled from weekly tv ratings, and this site says eps 138 and 139 both aired on 23rd August, with no ep on the 24th August, and eps 152 and 153 both aired on 12th September, with no ep on 13th September. BARB ratings data suggests five daily episodes those weeks as normal, although it could be a regional variation thing, since BARB would add together the regional viewing figures for the same episode, regardless of broadcast dates and times, as long they were all in the same broadcast week (Mon-Sun). I would guess the dates/times in the BARB data are for Thames, in which case it seems unlikely that another region went a day ahead temporarily, even if there was a good local reason for doing so.

If it helps the researching of UK airdates I currently have access to tv ratings for at least the 1989-93/4 period. They're top 30 lists for each channel, so if less than five H&A's make it into the ITV top 30 then something unusual must have happened that week. Unfortunately some weeks are missing, and the show wasn't charting consistently enough for this method in the first four-ish months, but still it adds extra evidence to the research. I've already studied up to May 1991 so far, and a few irregularities have jumped out at me. Home and Away did not chart on Xmas Day Monday or Boxing Day Tuesday 1989 or News Year Day Monday 1990, so I had assumed that there were no episodes those days, messages in this thread suggest that may not be the case, but if there were episodes on any of those days then the viewing figures for such episodes would have to have dropped from the then average of 12-13m down to less than 8.44m for Xmas Day/Boxing Day, and less than 9.87m for New Years Day, as these were the figures for ITV's 30th highest ranked shows in those weeks. There is no charted episode for Monday 28th May 1990, which appears from other entries to be due to Telethon '90, but it isn't clear if there was no episode, or if they just aired the show within the Telethon and therefore didn't get separate viewing figures for it on that occasion. There is also no charted episode for Friday 8th June 1990, which seems to be due to World Cup Italia '90 (which aired that day on ITV from 16:00), though there could still have been one or both airings at earlier times, but, if so, they would have to have got less than 7.55m combined. Thursday 22nd November 1990 also sees no charted episode, which appears to be due to the resignation of one Margaret T of Westminster that day, so I'm guessing it was bumped for an ITN special or some such. I don't have xmas week 1990 unfortunately, but the following week it definitely aired on New Years Eve Monday, but no charted episode appears for New Years Day Tues, which in a week when episodes on the other four days that week got between 12 and 14.66m, would require an audience of less than 9.68m if it did air, so it looks likely to me that there was no episode that day. Most of the data I have includes the broadcast times for charting episodes, presumably for Thames/LWT, if that would be of any additional help.