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2012 Atlantic Journalism Awards Finalists

Attachments



Slug/Label
Date Aired or Published October 3, 2012
Media outlet where first aired or published: Times & Transcript
Name of Program:
If co-produced, list partner:
Location:
List awards, grants:
Running time (TV/Radio):

Short explanation of the story and how it developed:

I first heard of an emergency landing of an airliner at the Greater Moncton International Airport from a long cultivated contact who happened to be among the emergency responders early that morning, October 2. By the time I was contacted the plane had already landed safely, but I headed to the airport because I felt there was news value in the incident itself and in its echoes of both the Swissair disaster and the Moncton airport's reception of stranded passengers after the September 11 terror attacks. After many hours at the airport, interrupted by work on other assignments, and a combination of first-person accounts and online sleuthing, I learned this was not the first troubling incident with the aircraft, something I believe I was alone among reporters in uncovering that day.

Resources of the newsroom (money and time) available to complete the story:

It was done as part of a regular shift with the help of a staff photographer. It was my main assignment of the day but I filed three other stories on other topics as well on that shift, though all were comparatively simple.

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