Explosions rock Baghdad, TV goes off the air

Reuters

[kattracks]

Explosions rock Baghdad, TV goes off the air

BAGHDAD, March 25 (Reuters) - Large explosions rocked Baghdad late on Tuesday and Iraqi television went off air as the first blast struck the capital.

Reuters correpondent Samia Nakhoul said several large explosions were heard and televisions in one hotel where journalists were staying immediately went black.

An official at Iraq's television station blamed a "technical problem in the transmitters" for the blackout.

The televisions remained off the air near midnight.

At least three powerful blasts rocked the city centre, an area where the television and radio headquarters and transmitters are located.

The television transmitters normally beam programmes, including news conferences by the Iraqi leadership, to a large part of the city. Iraqi radio continued broadcasting.

Baghdad was hit by repeated air strikes on Tuesday, many of them centred on locations to the east of the city where members of Iraq's Republican Guard were believed to be dug in to defend the city from U.S. ground forces approaching from the south.

03/25/03 15:55 ET

[dfwgator]

Now they need to take out Al-Jazeera.

[gulfcoast6]

Yeah, three of them were seen leaving at a high rate of speed on foot towards the river.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

OFFICIAL BUMP(TOPIC)LIST

[areafiftyone]

Just peel them off like a bandaid!

[Diddle E. Squat]

"...an angel still rides in the whirlwind and directs this storm..."

[j_k_l]

"technical problem in the transmitters"

Could this be the problem?

[GLDNGUN]

HOO-WAA!

[Duckdog]

I want that pin!!!!!

[JustinV]

I wonder if this has anything to do with the 'soldiers' in US uniforms killing the surrendering soldiers. It would be real bad to let them use that as propoganda.

[kabar]

Should have been done several days ago. No more business as usual. This sends a message throughout the country (including Basra) that Saddam is losing control.

[Oldeconomybuyer]

Also reported by Wolf Blitzer on CNN.

[Constitution Day]

Cool. I used to have a bumper sticker to that effect.

[FreeTheHostages]

Looks like a lot of communications are going down.

By PETER SVENSSON
The Associated Press
Tuesday, March 25, 2003; 12:30 PM

Hackers attacked the Web site of Arab satellite television network Al-Jazeera on Tuesday, rendering it intermittently unavailable, the site's host said.

The newly launched English-language page, which went live Monday, was hardest hit in a bombardment of data packets known as a denial-of-service attack.

Ayman Arrashid, Internet system administrator at the Horizons Media and Information Services, the site's Web host, said the attack began Tuesday morning local time.

The Web host is based in the Persian Gulf state of Qatar. The servers that host the Al-Jazeera site are in France and the United States. Only the U.S. servers were under attack, said Arrashid, so the attackers were likely in the United States.

He said technicians were working to thwart the attack, but could not estimate when the site would be fully available again.

Al-Jazeera, also based in Qatar, is an unusually independent and powerful voice in the Arab world whose broadcasts of U.S. prisoners and war dead has angered many Americans. The English site carries at least one picture of a dead U.S. soldier.

Representatives of the broadcaster could not immediately be reached for comment.

In denial-of-service attacks, hackers normally send a deluge of false requests to Web servers, overloading them and making them unavailable to surfers.

[GaltMeister]

An official at Iraq's television station blamed a "technical problem in the transmitters" for the blackout.

Should probably read - "Tomahawk problem in the transmitters" LOL

Say 'goodnight' Dick!

[Porterville]

I don't know who advised Bush to keep that damn station up, but he should send him back to London, whoever he is.

[FreeTheHostages]

it is -- see my post 33

[SirAllen]

Yeah baby!

[Sabertooth]

Won't be off the air for long. Sounds like we're set up to broadcast on the frequency of Iraqi National TV.

It's "last chance before the siege" time.

[Oldeconomybuyer]

JDAM Remote Control ...

[snooker]

ROFLMAO