CBS again prospers with crimebusters in Dallas-Fort Worth ratings

Local Nielsen ratings snapshot (Thurs., Sept. 24)

by Ed Bark of UncleBarky.com

CBS' season premieres of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation and The Mentalist out-dueled ABC's two-hour return of Grey's Anatomy Thursday while NBC's The Jay Leno Show again had a chalk outline despite a guest appearance by Rush Limbaugh.

Meanwhile, the launch of ABC's heavily promoted FlashForward fared fairly well without setting off any ratings fireworks.

CSI amassed 431,795 D-FW viewers in the 8 p.m. hour while ABC's competing first hour of Grey's had 292,292. Mentalist then upped that ante to 445,081 viewers, with Grey's improving a bit to 298,935 viewers.

The two crime dramas also handily won their time slots among advertiser-craved 18-to-49-year-olds. Meanwhile, Leno ran a distant third in both measurements, with just 112,931 total viewers. A notably trim Limbaugh, who remained full of himself, delighted in running down likenesses of environmentalists Al Gore and Ed Begley Jr. during his tour around the show's outdoor track in an electric-powered car.

Thursday's prime-time hours opened with Fox's Bones winning at 7 p.m. with 232,505 total viewers. FlashForward ran second with 179,361 viewers, edging CBS' Survivor: Samoa (166,075 viewers). In a tight race for 18-to-49-year-olds, Survivor led the pack while FlashForward slipped to third behind Bones.

Local news derby results found WFAA8 ending CBS11's three-weeknight winning streak in total viewers by topping the 10 p.m. Nielsens in that measurement. WFAA8 also won among 25-to-54-year-olds, the main advertiser target audience for news programming. NBC5 ran third in total viewers and fourth with 25-to-54-year-olds.

The Peacock again had better news at 6 a.m., where it finished first in both measurements for the fifth consecutive weekday.

WFAA8 tied Fox4 at 6 p.m. in total viewers and won outright at 5 p.m. But Fox4 won at both hours in the 25-to-54 demographic.