For two hours on Wednesday Gordy's Pizza & Pasta in Port Angeles, Washington was barraged with calls from American Idol fans.
The Peninsula Daily News reports that the restaurant received over 71 million misplaced calls. Gordy's owner Randy Sexton said that the staff answered every call and treated the person on the other end like they would have any customer.
Sexton expressed concern that the problem would persist for all of the remaining twelve weeks of American Idol's current thirteenth season. An unnamed spokesperson for the show apologized and said "we are currently working closely with the phone carrier to identify what happened and the best solution to this matter". Sandy Bennett, who is the general manager for Telescope, the company that oversees the singing competition's voting, advised Gordy's to block out-of-state calls when the show airs again.
Fox News notes that the show has had phone mix-ups in the past. In season four the wrong numbers for three contestants were shown on screen, causing millions of votes to go uncounted and in season eight calls for one contestant went to an adult entertainment company.
image: Fox