Thousands of people switching on their TVs on Sunday night were faced with a blank screen after a transmitter fault.

Instead of watching controversial twins John and Edward getting booted off the X-Factor and Brighton model Katie Price enduring another trial on I'm A Celebrity viewers were faced with a TV blackout.

The Whitehawk Hill relay transmitter, in Brighton, which serves an estimated 180,000 homes, was knocked offline by an electrical fault.

The electrical fault only affected people with a digital Freeview box with those watching television through an analogue set were not affected.

A spokesman for company Arqiva, which owns and operates the country's TV transmitters, said the mains fault should have meant that a back-up generator kicked in but that too failed.

He said: “Something went wrong with that switchover and it was then stuck in that mode.

“It happened at 8.15pm and was restored by an engineer at 10.42pm.”

The Whitehawk Hill relay transmitter boosts the main signal from the main Rowridge mast on the Isle of Wight.

People living in areas not covered by the relay transmitter still had problems with their reception because of the bad weather.

Last night's heavy wind and rain affected channels such as ITV1 and Channel 4 which are broadcast on a separate, and slightly weaker, digital frequency to BBC channels.

While the problem was fixed at 10.45pm, people may still be experiencing problems with their digital set top boxes and receiving no channels.

TV viewers who tried to retune their boxes during the fault may have wiped the tuning information from their boxes.

The Arqiva spokesman added: “Normally the picture would have just come back but if people tried to retune during the fault, depending on the box, they might have lost the tuning details.

“If they retune their box now then it should be all right.”

The Meridian television area is due to go fully digital at the end of March 2012 when the analogue signal is switched off.

To continue watching TV, people will need to buy a digital set top box or buy a new digital television.

For more information about digital TV call 08456 50 50 50.