What show were you watching when a major news event happened?

[daniel anderson]

I was watching the World Series in 1989 when the Earthquake happened. I can still remember hearing Al Michaels say "I'll tell you what, we're having an earth-" before the feed cut out. I remember ABC airing something else for a few minutes, before Ted Koppel came on form Washington(where he was hosting Nightline).

[David Risner]

I was watching Bear in the Big Blue House on Disney Channel with my just starting to walk daughter when my friend called me up and told me to put the news on the morning of 9/11. 

Most things, though, have happened during the day when at work or in school. I did watch the tsunami that hit Japan, but I turned on the TV to see it after reading something on Twitter about it. 

On Wed, Jul 22, 2020, 5:13 PM daniel anderson <danieland...@gmail.com> wrote:

I was watching the World Series in 1989 when the Earthquake happened. I can still remember hearing Al Michaels say "I'll tell you what, we're having an earth-" before the feed cut out. I remember ABC airing something else for a few minutes, before Ted Koppel came on form Washington(where he was hosting Nightline).

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TVorNotTV" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to tvornottv+...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/cfc7388a-734b-46d7-8501-4395409f05ceo%40googlegroups.com.

[Dave Sikula]

Earliest one I remember is Ruby shooting Oswald. They replayed that one so often that weekend I'm surprised they didn't wear out the videotape.

--Dave Sikula

[Bob Jersey]

Aug 8th 1974, around 9:00pm east... "The Mac Davis Show," whose star was riding the Billboard charts at the time, got its ending cut off when on came whichever anchor (I'm guessing Reasoner) ready to throw it to the White House, where President Nixon would shortly announce his resignation.  (I don't recall being able to watch the moon landing live.)

B

daniel anderson, today (7/23):

[Kevin M.]

As I look back, I wasn’t watching TV during any of the big moments.

Challenger disaster: I was in Catholic school. We were in the habit of watching shuttle launches in the classroom to the point where it had become monotonous, so we didn’t even watch it live. It wasn’t until the principal came into the classroom and told the teacher the turn on the TV that we saw it replayed. However, a camera crew from KABC 7 went to my sister’s high school to get reaction from young people. If anybody has that videotape, please send it my way.

9/11: I was working a graveyard shift at a Kinkos-like copy store and had gotten home from work. Maybe an hour after I fell asleep, a friend called me and asked if I was watching. I asked what channel, and he replied “Every channel... we are at war.”

Colombia disaster: I was in the Peace Corps in an Internet cafe in Kazakhstan. There was undoubtedly a mix of over-bass techno music playing overhead. One stranger walked over to me and patted me on the shoulder and said “I’m sorry” in Russian. A few seconds later another stranger did the same. I didn’t even know why they were offering condolences at that moment.

Addendum: I recently bought and watched an episode of Kojak on the iTunes Store, specifically because the episode was originally broadcast the exact day and year I was born. If you ever get the chance, do some research and find media from your actual date of birth. There is no way anything remotely resembling that hour of television could be broadcast today. The treatment of women, the portrayals of minorities and drug use... oh my.

--

You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TVorNotTV" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to tvornottv+...@googlegroups.com.

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/21f9d1bb-eebc-47a1-9cca-e4ce153c018bn%40googlegroups.com.

--

Kevin M. (RPCV)

[stannc]

Nixon resigns: one of the networks. The evening edition of the New York Post had a front page that said “Nixon Resigns Tonight” so we were well prepared. My brother tried to record it from the tv speaker with a portable tape recorder.

1977 NYC blackout: I was watching a CPO Sharkey rerun when the lights went out on Long Island too. After a couple of hours we got electricity back and the local cable company pulled in network affiliates from Connecticut until the NYC stations came back online

Miracle on Ice: watching the game at home, like everyone else

Challenger: I was at work at a bank branch. We pulled our TV from the break room to the lobby so that we could watch while working.

1989 Earthquake: watching the game.

O.J. Simpson chase: we were at a bar after work watching the Knicks in the NBA playoffs when the TVs switched to a split screen

9/11/01: working from home that day, my text pager (remember those?) got a CNN alert about a small plane hitting the WTC. I turned on the TV in time to see the second plane hit. The company that I was working for first sent home all employees nationwide who were in tall buildings. A couple of hours later everything got shut down. Somewhere, I’ve saved all of the CNN text alerts from that day, some of which were incorrect.

Up until recently a friend and I would send a text to each other if there was a major news event. It was one of:
“Have you seen the footage?”
“Brought to you by Texxon”
“John David Stubbs”

All of these are shorthand for the 1983 “Murder of Buckwheat” SNL episode, which through the beginning of 2020 was a fairly accurate parody of how TV news covers major news stories. You can draw a direct parallel between that series of sketches and the Kobe Bryant coverage from February. (Doesn’t that seem like a million years ago?)


-Stan

[Ben Scripps]

I was in middle school English when Challenger happened; they ended up sending us home early that day.

Like Kevin, I slept through the first couple of hours of 9/11.  When I woke up around 11, I had a breathless message from a friend telling me to turn on the TV because something terrible had happened.  Once the tube warmed up, whatever channel I was on was showing the Pentagon, and as I stepped up through the channels to get to my station, each channel along the way happened to be either on the Pentagon or in-studio anchors, leaving me to think “Well, a plane crashing into the Pentagon certainly is tragic, but it’s not that big a deal."  Then I hit the Home Shopping Channel and saw they’d shut down and knew there must be more than what I’d seen.  One of the weirdest days I’ve ever had at work.

And Stan, I got the reference as soon as I saw “Texxon”.  Still one of my favorite bits of SNL of all time.

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/CAKgmY4CKT56_vU%3D9AZkHtD%2Bkbn4f0tydBgnQ36DcdBYpUaPb%2BA%40mail.gmail.com.

[Chris Neuman]

My wife and I moved from Toronto to Chicago about 10 days before September 11. We were staying with a friend in Lincoln Park while we waited for our place to be ready in Evanston and we’re occupying he second bedroom with a view of the El tracks just south of Belmont. What woke us up first was the relative absence of trains, then our host knocking and saying we should get up and get to the TV. We watched like most people, transfixed, keenly aware that we had just become foreigners, immigrants (Though I don’t pretend to assume what we experienced was anything like our racialized friends). I never saw so many flags on front steps in the space of 12 hours. And the three Canadians huddled in a walk up on Bissell Street were delighted to find a channel that carried the CBC coverage. The dulcet tones of Peter Mansbridge and the less dulcet tones of PM Jean Chrétien were a balm in those first raw hours. 

Sorry, not “what we’re you watching” but as I recall the channel simulcasting CBC involved Al Gore — if memory serves it eventually became Al Jazeera US, maybe?

Chris

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/C158F613-3820-4010-8980-2FD03451830F%40benscripps.com.

[Mark Jeffries]

It was probably Newsworld International, which was owned by the CBC.  It eventually became AJA, but not before Al Gore ran it as Current TV.

Mark Jeffries
Saints Spotlight Editor
spotl...@gmail.com

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/CAGU22ux47uJNvOG2dKEn2%2BAucC6bxEvPnhnCEzreYisooiPqNA%40mail.gmail.com.

[John Edwards]

The only big event I remember happening while I was watching TV was the 1989 San Francisco Earthquake. I had started to watch the game, and when the earthquake hit I thought the cable had gone out, so I started trying to flip around to other channels. A few minutes later, I realized what happened.

I do remember watching the start of the Iraq War on CNN. I was a freshman in college and we stayed up most of the night watching it. I also recall being out shopping either just before or just after it started, and overhearing people being eager to ensure that they had CNN in their cable packages. 

When the Challenger exploded, I had the day off school, so I'd gone grocery shopping with my mother that morning. By the time we picked up my grandmother, she got into the car and told us what had happened.

For the OJ chase, I was actually asleep when it started. I was working the graveyard shift at a convenience store at the time, and I tended to sleep in the afternoons. I had seen the news in the morning that he was supposed to turn himself in and had failed to show. When I woke up, the Bronco was going down the freeway. 

When 9/11 happened, I had just dropped my wife at school (she had just started her Master's) and was on my way back to my office when I heard the news on the radio that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center. I got into my office about 10 minutes later and started trying to stream what I could. Since this was 2001, that turned out to be NPR's live stream, since the CNN website was so overrun that it turned into text only. I worked in a basement office at the time, so we weren't 

John

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/CAGU22ux47uJNvOG2dKEn2%2BAucC6bxEvPnhnCEzreYisooiPqNA%40mail.gmail.com.

--

John Edwards
"You can insure against the weather, but you can't insure against incompetence, can you?" - Phil Tufnell

--

John Edwards
"You can insure against the weather, but you can't insure against incompetence, can you?" - Phil Tufnell

[PGage]

Perhaps my earliest memory like this was watching Bobby Kennedy get murdered. I was precociously interested in politics, and my mother took me to hear all of the Democratic nominees for president that year. She was a Eugene McCarthy girl, and the first we saw but then we went to see Bobby speak, a week or two later and I was mesmerized. I could decode his speech enough to get his opposition to the war, and support for racial and economic justice, but his charisma really got through to me, and the crowd at the college campus where my dad taught was going wild. I got the chance to shake his hand, and declared myself a Bobby man to my mother on the way home, as we had a satisfying debate. She of course was old enough to remember the old RFK, who had been a “Red-Baiter” and his brother’s son of a bitch, and she never trusted him.

The night of the California primary she let me stay up to watch the results. I remember staying awake long enough to see that Bobby had won, then fell asleep during his speech. I was awakened shortly after by the sound of my mother’s screams and then crying, saying “not again” over and over, as he was shot in the kitchen of the Ambassador hotel. I was heartbroken and inconsolable.

I am just old enough to remember where I was when his brother was shot, but we heard that announcement live on the radio, not TV, on the way to taking me to the doctor. My mother pulling over to the side of the San Diego freeway to cry, and my grandmother in the back seat screaming (extremely uncharacteristically, as she was very refined): “God Dammit! God Dammit! I knew he shouldn’t have gone down there!”

On Wed, Jul 22, 2020 at 5:13 PM daniel anderson <danieland...@gmail.com> wrote:

I was watching the World Series in 1989 when the Earthquake happened. I can still remember hearing Al Michaels say "I'll tell you what, we're having an earth-" before the feed cut out. I remember ABC airing something else for a few minutes, before Ted Koppel came on form Washington(where he was hosting Nightline).

--

You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TVorNotTV" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to tvornottv+...@googlegroups.com.

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/cfc7388a-734b-46d7-8501-4395409f05ceo%40googlegroups.com.

--

Sent from Gmail Mobile

[daniel anderson]

My grandmother was watching some soap opera when JFK was shot. When Cronkite announced JFK's death, she was heartbroken. 

To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to tvor...@googlegroups.com.

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/cfc7388a-734b-46d7-8501-4395409f05ceo%40googlegroups.com.

[Kevin M.]

On Mon, Jul 27, 2020 at 8:08 AM daniel anderson <danieland...@gmail.com> wrote:

My grandmother was watching some soap opera when JFK was shot. When Cronkite announced JFK's death, she was heartbroken. 

Heartbroken because he was shot, or heartbroken because they interrupted her stories? My grandma loved her stories.

To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to tvornottv+...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/a2794511-549b-4ce3-935f-06b1e7004009o%40googlegroups.com.

--

Kevin M. (RPCV)

[daniel anderson]

Because he was killed. Likely because she had voted for him in 60.

I was heartbroken myself when 9/11 took place, because it disrupted our normal way of living.

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/a2794511-549b-4ce3-935f-06b1e7004009o%40googlegroups.com.

--

Kevin M. (RPCV)

[daniel anderson]

Speaking of jFK, i've read about that the soap was As The World Turns, because Helen Wagner once said that she didn't know that something was wrong until she left the set and Charles Paul who was playing the organ told her that Kennedy had been shot. I'm guessing he heard Cronkite's announcements, but the cast didn't.

[Kevin M.]

On Mon, Jul 27, 2020 at 8:33 AM daniel anderson <danieland...@gmail.com> wrote:

Speaking of jFK, i've read about that the soap was As The World Turns, because Helen Wagner once said that she didn't know that something was wrong until she left the set and Charles Paul who was playing the organ told her that Kennedy had been shot. I'm guessing he heard Cronkite's announcements, but the cast didn't.

In one of his autobiographies, Sherwood Schwartz wrote about filming the pilot episode of Gilligan’s Island the day JFK was shot. Not the best day for slapstick comedy. 

On Wednesday, July 22, 2020 at 8:13:47 PM UTC-4, daniel anderson wrote:

I was watching the World Series in 1989 when the Earthquake happened. I can still remember hearing Al Michaels say "I'll tell you what, we're having an earth-" before the feed cut out. I remember ABC airing something else for a few minutes, before Ted Koppel came on form Washington(where he was hosting Nightline).

--

You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TVorNotTV" group.

To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to tvornottv+...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/13048c76-a2f0-451d-8db5-3a0c3adee192o%40googlegroups.com.

--

Kevin M. (RPCV)

[Jim Ellwanger]

Unlike the actors, the organist would have been wearing a headset to hear the communication from the control room (where, for a live production, there would have been an "air" monitor to show what was actually being broadcast).

[Jim Ellwanger]

> On Jul 27, 2020, at 9:14 AM, Kevin M. <drunkba...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> In one of his autobiographies, Sherwood Schwartz wrote about filming the pilot episode of Gilligan’s Island the day JFK was shot. Not the best day for slapstick comedy.

The shot of the Minnow leaving the harbor in the first-season opening titles was shot in Honolulu a couple days after the assassination -- there's a flag at half-mast that's briefly visible in the background. (A year later, they reshot the opening in color for the second season, but that time they only traveled as far as Long Beach, California.)

[daniel anderson]

I still remember the Newtown school shooting, because i was watching Days of Our Lives(soap) when the so called "chimes of doom" sounded. Same thing with the Virginia Tech shooting too. I've always wondered how long those chimes have been used anyway? 

On Wednesday, July 22, 2020 at 8:13:47 PM UTC-4, daniel anderson wrote:

[Bob Jersey]

Since the company's radio-only days, though the exact first date of use is in dispute... http://www.nbcchimes.info/nbcorigin.php (link)

daniel anderson, today (7/27):

I still remember the Newtown school shooting, because i was watching Days of Our Lives(soap) when the so called "chimes of doom" sounded. Same thing with the Virginia Tech shooting too. I've always wondered how long those chimes have been used anyway? 

B

[Jim Ellwanger]

I believe Daniel is specifically referring to the use of the chimes as part of the “NBC News Special Report” intro — for example, at the 5-second mark here, after the countdown: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tEX6Wr9Iz00

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TVorNotTV" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to tvornottv+...@googlegroups.com.

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/93f7e719-0ee5-4ce9-917c-7cdd55b92c4eo%40googlegroups.com.

[bobjersey]

They used that format for this S.R. on the double-murder conviction of Scott Peterson in 2004... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1CugARmyXt8 (link)

Jim Ellwanger, tonight (7/27):

> I believe Daniel is specifically referring to the use of the chimes
> as part of the “NBC News Special Report” intro — for example, at the
> 5-second mark here, after the countdown:
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tEX6Wr9Iz00

B

[JW]

> Speaking of jFK, i've read about that the soap was As The World Turns,
> because Helen Wagner once said that she didn't know that something was
> wrong until she left the set and Charles Paul who was playing the organ
> told her that Kennedy had been shot. I'm guessing he heard Cronkite's

> announcements, but the cast didn't.

You can get the soap, the commercials, and the bulletins within the first ten minutes here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c7fCpdvcl7k

[stannc]

The clips that I’ve found don’t agree on the specifics, but during World War II a fourth chime was used. Sometimes it’s a second sustained C, one clip has it as a different higher note.

-Stan

[Jim Ellwanger]

My understanding is that in the early days of the chimes, they had a few different chime tunes used for different purposes, and the four-chime version essentially meant, "hey, network or station employees, there's some big news happening, so come in to the office or at least call in."

The familiar three-chime version was originally a signal that meant, "attention affiliates, it's time for a station break." Since it was heard after every program, usually right after an announcer said, "This is the National Broadcasting Company," it quickly turned into an effective audio trademark for the network.

(The notes are "G-E-C," but it's an urban legend that it has any relation to the General Electric Corporation -- it just happens to be a reasonably pleasant-sounding C-major arpeggio.)

> On Jul 28, 2020, at 11:19 AM, stannc <sta...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> The clips that I’ve found don’t agree on the specifics, but during World War II a fourth chime was used. Sometimes it’s a second sustained C, one clip has it as a different higher note.
>
> -Stan
>

> --
> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TVorNotTV" group.
> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to tvornottv+...@googlegroups.com.

> To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/f7c04602-400e-4ed5-b691-8ca9c6e816e1o%40googlegroups.com.

[Kevin M.]

On Tue, Jul 28, 2020 at 11:51 AM Jim Ellwanger <trai...@ellwanger.tv> wrote:

My understanding is that in the early days of the chimes, they had a few different chime tunes used for different purposes, and the four-chime version essentially meant, "hey, network or station employees, there's some big news happening, so come in to the office or at least call in."

My understanding as a former Page is the reason the chimes were often inconsistent is because they were done live by different people throughout the broadcast day. 

The familiar three-chime version was originally a signal that meant, "attention affiliates, it's time for a station break." Since it was heard after every program, usually right after an announcer said, "This is the National Broadcasting Company," it quickly turned into an effective audio trademark for the network.

(The notes are "G-E-C," but it's an urban legend that it has any relation to the General Electric Corporation -- it just happens to be a reasonably pleasant-sounding C-major arpeggio.)

Yeah, the GEC connection to GE is corporate ret-conning 

> On Jul 28, 2020, at 11:19 AM, stannc <sta...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> The clips that I’ve found don’t agree on the specifics, but during World War II a fourth chime was used. Sometimes it’s a second sustained C, one clip has it as a different higher note.
>
> -Stan
>
> --
> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TVorNotTV" group.
> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to tvornottv+...@googlegroups.com.
> To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/f7c04602-400e-4ed5-b691-8ca9c6e816e1o%40googlegroups.com.

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TVorNotTV" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to tvornottv+...@googlegroups.com.

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/9D074023-3E2D-4112-BD13-D6B8ACE17785%40ellwanger.tv.

--

Kevin M. (RPCV)

[Bob Jersey]

Now that story is covered on the nbcchimes site...

Kevin M, to Jim Ellwanger and stannc, today (7/28):

My understanding is that in the early days of the chimes, they had a few different chime tunes used for different purposes, and the four-chime version essentially meant, "hey, network or station employees, there's some big news happening, so come in to the office or at least call in."

My understanding as a former Page is the reason the chimes were often inconsistent is because they were done live by different people throughout the broadcast day. 

The familiar three-chime version was originally a signal that meant, "attention affiliates, it's time for a station break." Since it was heard after every program, usually right after an announcer said, "This is the National Broadcasting Company," it quickly turned into an effective audio trademark for the network.

(The notes are "G-E-C," but it's an urban legend that it has any relation to the General Electric Corporation -- it just happens to be a reasonably pleasant-sounding C-major arpeggio.)

Yeah, the GEC connection to GE is corporate ret-conning 

B

[Doug Eastick]

1989 word series -- I was not watching it.  I was at University of Toronto and read about it on USENET... where people were reporting on it from what they saw on TV... then the university geeks started reporting of network splits and bay area sites going off.  (note: I'm not a sports guy -- I read about most of my sports info online, lol).

Challenger explosion...... I was in high school.   I had the morning off, so I slept in.   Just before 11am, I got out of bed... turned on CBS (game show, awaiting TPIR)... and went to the shower.   came out of the shower expecting TPIR.  I did not see TPIR live..... I saw replays of the explosion.  I've often been a NASA geek -- so I probably watched this for an 30 minutes in my towel.

Diana death -- I don't remember the specifics of when the news broke, but I recall Kevin Newman (formerly of Canadian nets) on ABC covering it that evening.

Gulf War start.   CNN.  I had recently moved into an apartment with my fiancée/wife... and hated the fact that I had to awake at 630am to make my commute to work to arrive at 8am.  However, the green missiles shown live from the Baghdad hotel live on CNN captured my attention until about midnight.

Reagan shot -- not TV..... but the gym teacher came into the gym and said Reagan was shot.

9/11 -- wasn't on TV.... read it on internet first, then headed to conference room at work and watched either CTV or CBC.  Continued to be shocked for days.

2016 election - a collection of CNN, CBC, CTV, etc.

[stannc]

G-E-C is also the pleasant sound that you hear when you try to shoplift at Lowe’s Home Improvement.

-Stan

[Tom Wolper]

On Wed, Jul 29, 2020 at 1:17 PM stannc <sta...@gmail.com> wrote:

G-E-C is also the pleasant sound that you hear when you try to shoplift at Lowe’s Home Improvement.

I'll take your word for that.

Some years ago I listened to all the extant 300+ episodes of Dragnet from NBC Radio. The recording always ended with the NBC chimes and once an announcer said, "Three chimes mean good times."

Going back to the question that started this thread, I have been reading along and trying to remember what I was watching when a major event happened. Not the event but the show and I can't think of any. I think network interruptions are rarer in the cable news era and especially during prime time since newsworthy stuff tends to happen during business hours. I wasn't watching TV when the 9/11 attacks happened and I wasn't watching when the Challenger exploded. The closest I can think of is I was sitting in Heinz Field at a Steelers game in 2001 when they stopped the game and President Bush came on the jumbotron to announce he was ordering US forces to Afghanistan.

[daniel anderson]

I remember that Directtv used the backhaul feeds on the AFC games that day until President Bush was done speaking- believe they waited till Dan Rather did the wrap up before switching back to  the regular network feeds. Up till Obama did his address about Newtown, it was the last time a NFL game was preempted for breaking news s far as i know.

[stannc]

I was sitting at Charlotte Motor Speedway on the same day in 2001. The race was about to start and it was an NBC race.
The jumbo screen at the track switched to a live feed of NBC News Special Report.

-Stan

[Eddie Anderson]

Doug Eastick wrote:
> Diana death -- I don't remember the specifics of when the
> news broke, but I recall Kevin Newman (formerly of Canadian
> nets) on ABC covering it that evening.

1) IIRC, that night I saw two breaking news reports which
interrupted programs. The first occurred during prime time.
It reported that Diana had been in a car accident.

The second occurred during snl. It reported that she had died.

Though I don't remember for sure, I assume that both of the
programs that were interrupted were reruns.

2) About 20 years before that, NBC interrupted snl to report
that Rep. Leo Ryan (and some of his staff members) had been
attacked (or killed? or were missing?) after visiting Jonestown.

3) This was not a major news event but I thought it was
interesting:

IIRC, about 7? years ago, I was watching the last half hour
of CBS Sunday Morning when our local CBS affiliate split the
screen (maybe a picture - in - picture mode?) to show an
unmanned rocket launch. (Many Orlando stations do this
routinely.)

The launch seemed to proceed normally for a minute or two,
but then the rocket appeared to explode. (Unfortunately,
that happens sometimes.)

What I found interesting was that the explosion wasn't
mentioned on the air. I.e. nobody from the local affiliate
came on the air to say anything about the rocket's apparent
failure.

IIRC, within minutes I checked some of the other local
stations; but, IIRC, I didn't find *any* other coverage of
that launch.

4) Again, this was not exactly a "major news event", but it
was something on TV news that was not a normal experience:

Back when I still had semi-regular Internet access, and
Gmail still let me download emails via the POP3 protocol, my
subscription to this group caused me to receive almost daily
digests in my email Inbox.

But, I often preferred to wait a few days and then "binge
read" those digests. Consequently, for several days, I
remained ignorant of Tom Heald's passing.

During that interval, I happened to watch part of an episode
of World News Now. In that episode, one of the anchors
(Jeremy? ?), announced Tom's passing.

IIRC, that was the first time that I had heard the name of
someone that I knew (however indirectly) mentioned on a
national news broadcast.



N.B. feel free to respond if you like. But please, don't be
disappointed if I can't see it (much less respond to it) for
awhile.

--
Eddie

[Jim Ellwanger]

> On Sep 6, 2020, at 10:04 AM, 'Eddie Anderson' via TVorNotTV <tvor...@googlegroups.com> wrote:
>
> Doug Eastick wrote:
>> Diana death -- I don't remember the specifics of when the
>> news broke, but I recall Kevin Newman (formerly of Canadian
>> nets) on ABC covering it that evening.
>
> 1) IIRC, that night I saw two breaking news reports which interrupted programs. The first occurred during prime time. It reported that Diana had been in a car accident.
>
> The second occurred during snl. It reported that she had died.
>
> Though I don't remember for sure, I assume that both of the programs that were interrupted were reruns.

I'll confirm that TV programming that night was reruns -- it was the Saturday of Labor Day weekend