Reggie Yates Recalls Embarrassing Moment He Swore Live On Radio 1

'There were families all over the country listening.'

Reggie Yates has opened up about one of his most embarrassing on-air moments, after he became a little too “relaxed” while presenting BBC’s Radio 1 Chart show.

Reflecting on some of his best memories with former co-host Fearne Cotton during an interview with HuffPost UK on ‘Build’, Reggie recalled the time he accidentally swore on air, calling it a “frustrating and funny moment”.

He explained: “[This is something] I’ve never repeated since… I swore on air, and I’d never done it before. And it was because we just got so relaxed during the bits between records.

“We had the Sugababes on, and we both knew the girls, so we were just chatting about family and having a giggle.”

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Reggie Yates
Nicky J Sims via Getty Images

Reggie continued: “Fearne was on the mic side with the girls, and I was on the desk. The record was counting down, we were just chatting away, and I was like ‘oh, the record’s finishing, one second’... and I was like, ‘yeah we’ve got the Sugababes here in the studio and we’ve got shitloads coming up’, and I just carried on! And everyone in the room just went, ‘huh?’.

“And this was the Chart Show on Sunday on Radio 1, and there were families all over the country listening. And Fearne just started dying… and I completely forgot that this had happened… but I remember it haunting me for years afterwards.”

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Reggie and Fearne in 2009
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Fortunately, Reggie remembered the moment being “too funny” for any of his BBC bosses to kick off, adding: “It was clearly me just losing myself in being relaxed.

“And obviously, your BBC training kicks in and I quite quickly just went, ‘oh my god I’m really sorry if anyone was offended, these are not the thoughts of the BBC’ - you just say [all that] and then you carry on.”

Reggie was appearing on ‘Build’ to promote the latest series of his documentary series ‘The Insider’, the second series of which begins streaming on BBC Three on 13 September.

Watch his full ‘Build’ interview, during which he discusses his experiences working on a toxic waste dump in Ghana, making the switch from entertainment presenting to covering more serious issues in his documentaries and his future plans in broadcasting, below: