During the height of our coverage of the terror attack at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, our News 96.5 WDBO newsroom was being pulled in many directions.
We were spreading our staff thin, working long hours and dealing with high stress.
Our phones were ringing non-stop from media around the world hoping get our reporters to give them first-hand information about the attack from the terrorist gunman.
National and international media were mobilizing their A-team network reporters and dispatching them to Orlando to stand on the front line of this breaking news story.
Meanwhile, we were fast adjusting our staffing and coverage to reflect the needs of our beloved Orlando community.
As the story broke on an early Sunday morning, our staffing and listening patterns were considerably different than if the story broke on a weekday.
In the chaos of those early hours on June 12th, we made the decision that we'd radically alter our popular and successful regular lineup to focus singularly on the Pulse nightclub terror attack.
As I write this, we're in the process of getting back to our regular lineup as the cycle of information coming out of the FBI investigation will surely hit a long plateau here soon.
In the days ahead, we'll conduct some reviews of our reaction and handling of the story-telling of the terrorist attack.
One of the calls we received during the process was from a Washington Post reporter who asked if he could come watch us behind-the-scenes. As it was literally one of hundreds of calls, I didn't give it too much more credence than any other inquiry we received.
The caller, Erin Patrick O'Conner, was an MMJ for the Washington Post. In our lingo, an MMJ is a multimedia journalist ... also known as a 'one-man band.' Typically MMJ's do everything on every story - write, voice, produce, shoot video, etc.
What follows is the result of several days of O'Conner shadowing WDBO reporters in the days following the Orlando terror attack.
On a personal note, I really admire Erin's skills.
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