By Ethan Ready

Technology issue at World Curling Championships

On-going hog line sensor issue hopes to be resolved by next year

Mar 26, 2022 | 10:35 AM

PRINCE GEORGE – Sitting around the CN Centre in the early days of the 2022 World Women’s Curling Championships had spectators seeing world-class curling for the first time asking a lot of questions.

One that was catching the eye of fans were the flashing lights on the curling rocks, and what exactly they were for.

The hog line sensors are built into the handle of the curling rock, and is designed to sense the passing of the initial hog line and if there’s a violation. A rock is supposed to be released before crossing the first thick black line.

If it’s a clean delivery, the lights will flash green. If not, then the lights switch to red and that rock is scored as a mis-throw.

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That’s how they’re supposed to work, but in the early few days of the tournament in Prince George, there were a number of malfunctioning sensors that resulted in false violations.

The same issue was an occurrence at the Olympics in Beijing.

As a result, the World Curling Federation turned to the honour system. Teams were responsible for keeping each other accountable and if there was a disagreement between skips, then an official would be brought in to monitor the hog line.

According to the World Curling Federation, the cause of the issue is a change in power source for the sensors. They’ve had to change to AAA batteries moving away from lithium batteries.

World Curling believes the technology will be fixed in time for major events held next year.