A newscast on a local television station in Hamilton, Ontario was interrupted yesterday by three minutes of hardcore gay pornography, which has drawn equal amounts of humour and outrage across social networks.

The incident occurred around 9.30 in the morning, local time, on the local CHCH television station, causing not inconsiderable embarrassment for the news director, according to the original report by The Hollywood Reporter.

The station was quick to disown responsibility, and said that it was a repair job gone awry, thanks to the work undertaken by a local cable company. Although CHCH attempted to recast their programme, they could not do so for roughly three minutes. Mike Katrycz, vice-precident of CHCH News, said: “In the splicing together, unfortunately, some inappropriate content went [on] air.”

He added: We discovered through quick investigation that it was not (our station), it was one of the cable companies that had patched it… There was nothing wrong with the transmission from (us)..it was a problem at one of the cable companies that was beyond our control.”

He was very apologetic about the incident, and admitted that the hardcore porn also reached people in the capital, Ottawa, through a repeat transmitter belonging to CHCH. Several apologies both on-air, and online, followed.

Mr Katrycz said in a statement: “This was in no way CHCH’s doing. We didn’t provide or supply that content, it suddenly appeared on cable and satellite distribution, not on our actual air.”

Perhaps the most irony-tinged comment came from one Anthony Urciuoli, who wrote on Twitter: “Thinking about filing a lawsuit with [sic] #CHCH for making me question my sexuality.”