Burst error

In telecommunication, a burst error or error burst is a contiguous sequence of symbols, received over a communication channel, such that the first and last symbols are in error and there exists no contiguous subsequence of m correctly received symbols within the error burst.

The integer parameter m is referred to as the guard band of the error burst. The last symbol in a burst and the first symbol in the following burst are accordingly separated by m correct bits or more. The parameter m should be specified when describing an error burst.