A dispute between Dish Network and the Sinclair Broadcast Group over fees the satellite service will pay for local broadcast stations blacked out service on Dish Wednesday for WTVC-TV9 in Chattanooga and 78 other local stations.
But after federal regulators Wednesday called Dish and Sinclair officials into an emergency meeting, an agreement in principle was announced Wednesday night that put the stations back on Dish.
Sinclair Deputy General Counsel Jeff Blum said the agreement will form the basis of a long-term retransmission consent agreement for carriage of Sinclair's local channels in 79 markets nationwide. Restoration of Sinclair signals to Dish system is underway, Blum said Wednesday night.
"We are grateful for the FCC's work on behalf of consumers to actively broker a productive path forward," Blum said.
The settlement came after Dish asked the Federal Communications Commission to stay action on its Verified Amended and Restated Retransmission Complaint and Request for Preliminary Injunctive Relief as the long-term agreement is being finalized.
Terms of the agreement were not disclosed.
FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler called the two sides together to "get to the bottom of the dispute and bring back local programming to consumers."
The stations went black Tuesday night after the two parties failed to reach a new transmission deal but the stations were back on the Dish by late Wednesday.
Before the service restoration, both sides blamed one another for the blackout of the stations on the satellite service.
Dish said that despite reaching an agreement on rates and all other terms for the carriage of the Sinclair local stations, Sinclair chose to begin "the largest local channel blackout in the history of television."
"Sinclair rejected our extension offer and has chosen to use innocent consumers as pawns to gain leverage for the economic benefit of Sinclair, while causing substantial harm and disruption to the lives of consumers," the company said.
However, a Sinclair statement on WTVC NewsChannel 9's website said Dish stopped carrying the Sinclair stations after the agreement with Dish expired at midnight Tuesday.
"We regret the inconvenience this will cause Dish Network subscribers who want to continue to watch the extremely popular programming that airs on these stations," Sinclair's statement said.
In the 16-county Chattanooga region, Scarborough Research estimates there are 80,249 adults who subscribe to Dish Network, or 10.8 percent of the adults in the Channel 9 viewing area. Scarborough counts 96,636 adults, or 12.6 percent of the area, as subscribers to DirectTV in the Chattanooga area.