First up, the big news from last night was the storms and blackout in Adelaide. Viewing dropped sharply on the night before, and some programs lost 120-150,000 viewers (such as Seven News and Seven News/Today Tonight), even accounting for the lower audience levels on a Wednesday night. All networks were impacted to varying degrees. So it’s why for example, Seven News and Seven News/Today Tonight failed to crack the million mark – they had just 1000 viewers each in Adelaide and 968,000 nationally and 954,000. The problems in Adelaide are why no programs had a million or more viewers in the metro markets last night. Given the problems in Adelaide, last night should really be declared a no result by Oztam, the ratings overseer.

Nielsen though, which runs the metering service for Oztam, reckons the figures are good to go, but with the very large caveat that the reporting sample is reduced and hence caution should be exercised when analysing data for Adelaide. Nielsen also points out that viewing was impacted between 15:48 to 18:56 due to storm activity and power outages. And further, the ongoing power restoration in Adelaide could result in a reduced reporting sample for the next few days.

Actually when Nine News shows up with a zero at 6pm, Nielsen’s view is hard to believe. Likewise The Chase on Seven at 5.30pm, also with a zero (both are also lead in programs for the rest of the night). The audiences had started drifting back by around 8.30pm when Nine’s Doctor Doctor had 39,000 viewers, and Ten’s the debuting The Wrong Girl 32,000. (Its kick off last night was depressed by the problems in Adelaide, which is a bit unfair). In fact it’s a bit of a joke. No accuracy at all in last night’s ratings – even if those for Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth were unaffected, the metro and national data was not an accurate representation of what was viewed on TV last night, especially compared to the night before.

The ratings produced share figures for Adelaide and the metro markets, but with actual viewing so low ( a faction of normal at some times, or zero!), they were at best an even rougher estimate than on good nights. So consider all the figures in today’s reports as highly qualified. The most accurate figures for Adelaide and the metro markets are those for mornings (including breakfast) and into the early afternoon until the storms hit and the blackouts started. — Click here to read Glenn Dyer’s full TV ratings.