Cable company gaffe placed porn in preschool slot

A broadcasting blunder earlier this week put porn in the place of a preschool cartoon on the Disney Channel in New Jersey.

U.S. cable giant Comcast is investigating how one of its local facilities in New Jersey ended up airing hardcore pornography instead of popular preschool cartoon Handy Manny — an educational show about a young, Latino repairman and his box of unruly, talking tools — on the Disney Channel's slot on Tuesday morning.

"We automatically detected the issue and it was corrected promptly. We apologize to any customer who experienced an issue [Tuesday] morning," spokesman Fred DeAndrea said.

He declined to reveal other details, including how long the pornography aired or how many homes it reached.

Comcast customer Paul Dunleavytold the New York Daily News he was shocked to discover his five-year-old son watching thebroadcast Tuesday morning.

"I couldn't believe it," he told the paper for its Wednesday edition. "We try to do the right thing to protect our kids from this stuff, and then they broadcast it on children's TV."

Comcast accepted full blame for the blunder, according to the Disney Channel.

"We value the trust that parents have in our programming and certainly take [Tuesday's] regrettable program disruption extremely seriously," said Disney Channel spokeswoman Karen Hobson.

"Comcast has taken full responsibility for this situation, and we understand that they are currently working to determine the root cause of the incident."

Last summer, Sweden's state broadcaster apologized after technicians accidentally showed an adult movie in the background of a news broadcast.