Max Headroom Incident

The **Max Headroom Incident** was a famous signal hijack that came in two parts. The perpetrators have still not been identified and therefore it cannot be confirmed if any of them have been arrested or even if they're still alive. During the night of November 22, 1987, the incident occurred in Chicago, Illinois.

## First incident

The first incident happened at 9:14 PM on the channel WGN-TV. In the sports section of The Nine O'Clock News, the show was cut off and a buzzing sound played while an unidentified man in a Max Headroom mask sways from side to side as if he's drunk while someone spins a corrugated metal panel behind him to resemble the background in Max Headroom's show, 20 Minutes into the Future. Whether the man is making any actual sound is unknown due to the loud buzzing. After about 17 seconds, WGN regained control of the channel and, confused, continued their broadcast.

## Second incident

This occurred 2 hours later at approximately 11:20 PM, the channel WTTW was playing the Dr Who episode, Horror of Fang Rock, when the episode cut to static for a second and then the hijackers make a return. Because it's so late, no one was on duty to stop the hijack. This time, the buzzing is quieter and you can hear him talking, albeit hard to understand. In this hacking, he does a lot more. He starts off saying "That does it. He's a freakin' nerd! \*laughs\* Yeah I think I'm better than Chuck Swirsky. Freakin' liberal! \*groans in what's supposed to sound like pain\*" Chuck Swirsky is a radio sports commentator. The man creases with laughter and can be heard saying "Oh Jesus" and "Go to hell". He holds up a can of coke and says "Catch the wave" before dropping it to the floor. This is a reference to Max Headroom's coke advertisement in which he says that. He flips off the camera, appearing to have a hollowed out dildo on his middle finger. He picks the can back up and sings the phrase "Your love is fading", laughs even more as he drops the can, and then proceeds to hum the intro to Clutch Cargo, saying "I still see the X", a reference to the last episode, and then finishes the intro song.

He then says "Ohhhhhhhh, my piles" which could possibly mean he has hemorrhoid's. He starts making fake flatulence noises before saying "Oh I just made a giant masterpiece for all the greatest world newspaper nerds!". He picks a glove up and puts it on the hand without the dildo on his finger and says "My brother is wearing the other one... but it's dirty! Ugh! Looks like you got footprints on it!" and throws it away. The video cuts to later on, now the mask and dildo have been removed, the dildo shoved into the mouth of the mask which is being held by the man impersonating Max. His face is off screen. He puts the mask down after saying "They're coming to get me!" and a woman in a French maid outfit says "Bend over bitch" to him, and he pulls his pants down to expose his posterior and is repeatedly spanked by the woman with a fly swatter. He moans in pain and the hijack cuts off (by the hijackers themselves as there was still no one on duty) and goes back to the episode, right when the line "As far as I can tell a massive electric shock, he died instantly" is said. Some believe it was not a coincidence that the interruption returned back to normal at that time.

## Trivia

The hijackers have not been caught yet.

While it's unknown about the first hijack, the second had already been recorded as it cut between two scenes, the talking and the spanking.

This has become the most well-known and infamous broadcast interruption ever due to its disturbing nature, references to popular culture, and the fact that nobody knows who did it.

There appears to be 3 people present in the room - the man in the Max Headroom mask, the woman in the maid outfit, and the person spinning the corrugated metal panel.

NORCAM once created a parody of this which was the second but reversed and edited, with new audio added on.

## Videos

(RARE VIDEO) Max Headroom - The 1st IncidentFirst incident(RARE VIDEO) Max Headroom - The 2nd IncidentSecond incident, with subtitles