OBSOLETE. The excision of damaged DNA during pyrimidine-dimer repair. A large multienzyme complex scans the DNA for a distortion in the double helix rather than for a specific base change. Once a bulky lesion is found, the phosphodiester backbone of the abnormal strand is cleaved on both sides of the distortion, and the portion of the strand containing the lesion (an oligonucleotide) is peeled away from the DNA double helix by a DNA helicase enzyme.