WASHINGTON — That scrambled picture during the football game might not be your old TV’s fault, at least not this weekend.

Officials from the Defense Media Center announced that viewers of American Forces Network television may experience brief programming interruptions due to the fall "sun outage" period, which began Tuesday.

The interference occurs twice a year as AFN satellites eclipse the sun. Solar radiation can overwhelm broadcast signals, causing broadcast outages lasting up to 30 minutes.

The most severe outages are expected to occur between now and Oct. 8, although problems could linger until Oct. 14. The outages may occur throughout the day, even after sunset, as signals are bounced from satellite to satellite around the globe.

In addition, AFN’s Web sites are scheduled to go offline this weekend for scheduled maintenance.

The pages will be down from 3 to 8 a.m. Baghdad time on Saturday, and from 11 p.m. Saturday to 3 a.m. Sunday Baghdad time.