BBC One's Traffic Cops overpower Hell's Kitchen

LONDON - BBC One's 'Traffic Cops' documentary series won the prime time slot with 4.2m viewers, 700,000 more than tuned in for ITV1's 'Hell's Kitchen', according to unofficial overnight figures.

Last night's instalment, which saw the Traffic Cops uncovering stashes of drugs that even a sniffer dog failed to find, attracted a 17.5% share of the 9pm-10pm audience.

It beat ITV1's 'Hell's Kitchen', which saw American superstar chef Mario Batali joining Marco Pierre White to put the celebrities through their paces with a special cooking challenge.

The programme pulled in 3.5m viewers and a 14.9% share of the audience, which was up 1m viewers on the previous night when it trailed BBC One's 'The Apprentice' by a long distance.

The fourth episode of Five's US crime drama 'The Mentalist', which saw fake psychic Patrick Jane investigating the death of a wealthy political donor, netted 2.3m viewers and a 9.6% share of the audience. The series' appeal appears to have faded somewhat after a big debut of 3.6m.

The first episode of 'Professor Regan's Diet Clinic', examining claims made by the diet industry, drew 1.7m viewers and a 7% share of the audience to BBC Two.

Channel 4's 'Missing: Race Against Time' documentary, following a handful of the 300 missing persons reports received by the Greater Manchester Police every week, scored 1.5m viewers and a 6.2% share of the audience. Including Channel 4+1 figures it reached 1.6m viewers.

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