'Sesame Street' To Air Hurricane-Themed Episode This Friday

The good news for Big Bird is Obama won. The bad news though is that his nest was hit pretty bad by last week’s superstorm.

In the wake of Sandy, Sesame Street will air a special hurricane episode that will focus on Big Bird’s loss and the clean-up process that will help get the neighborhood back to normal.

The special, airing this Friday on PBS, is not new, but edited from a previous 5-part episode that first aired in 2001 and then again in 2006 after Hurricane Katrina.

This time around though the producers made a few changes to the episode, according to Entertainment Weekly.

“When the show had originally been written, it wasn’t intended to go after a devastating disaster. It was intended to maybe be used as a tool for people to prepare for a storm,” Sesame Street supervising producer Nadine Zylstra told the mag.

This time it will focus specifically on what happens after a storm hits Sesame Street and specifically on the rebuilding of Big Bird's nest.

Zystra also explained that it wasn’t easy to make the edits to the original tapes, which were in a storage facility in Queens, New York. The team though managed to brave the elements and get things done  - including one assistant editor who broke her wrist after being hit by a car while riding her bike from her Brooklyn home to Sesame Street’s Manhattan offices.

“She was here the next day,” Zystra explained. “Saying, ‘Okay, I’m ready. I can digitize with my other hand.’”

Check PBS local listings to see when the special is airing in your neighborhood.

- Shannon Carlin, CBS Local