It offered story after story written by news service reporters. These were pre-computer days, and we first made contact with written news from teletype machines, which chugged along in a really loud incessant way, in a wire room, which every radio station had. You had to keep listening and evaluating. I picked up speed and understanding every day, working alongside an incredible and seasoned news staff, reporters, writers, editors, producers, engineers, the news directors, the sales people, every single person there made an impact, and we all had to monitor the product, what went out over the air. It was at this radio station, in this era, with these people, at just the right time of my development. I don't think this would have happened to me in any other place. If you're any good, nothing sneaks up on you, and you "land in a safe place," every time, to begin the cycle again. The News88 helicopter pilots, Neal Busch and Lou Timolat, called it "situational awareness" as the engine runs. It's both very hard and inexplicably rewarding, this 360 degree awareness. The clock was the master, and the mission was keeping the radio audience running with you, wide open to the voices and sounds that convey an endless road of information and thoughts that have impact on their world. Within that learning curve was a thinking work cycle you lived by, survived by: a sequence of what just happened, what to make sure to remember from it, while maneuvering within the parameters of what is happening now, and preparing in the back of your mind for what's coming up, and fast. You had to step on the conveyer belt and hold on and contribute. But here, at News88, an intense place of information and traffic, both on the ground and in the air, there were people all around who could teach you by example as well as what was simply required of you. I was used to the limits that people placed on me. In the early 1970s I was hired as the first woman anchor at WCBS News Radio. W orking in news, particularly in live radio news, especially in the way it used to exist in the early 1970s, you discovered every day how much more you are capable of learning and executing, more than you would have ever thought possible, and it surprises you in a very exciting way. As a licensed pilot herself, who once headed public affairs for the Eastern Region of the FAA out of JFK, who better than Rita to tell both the helicopter story and her own? -DS Chopper 11 left its hangar at the Allegheny County Airport ( KAGC) this morning.In the fourteen years in which she anchored at WCBS, including afternoon drive with the likes of Tom Franklin, Gary Maurer, and Harvey Hauptman, Rita Sands got to know the station's chopper pilots, both on and off the air. If I had to guess, WPXI (and other broadcasters) haven’t billed so well throughout 2020 and rent on the chopper and the salary of its pilot were the obvious choices to cut. Chopper 11 (N27M) flew from the Allegheny County Airport over to the WPXI studios and then circled over the mayor’s home. A screen grab from dating back to Augwhen protestors stood outside Pittsburgh Mayor Peduto’s home. It could be possible that the rent was raised. The flying machine has been in existence since 1997. Here are side by side photos of the helicopter as “Chopper 11” and its previous incarnation for a station elsewhere. The helicopter actually belongs to Helicopters Inc. WPXI didn’t own “N27M” (the chopper’s callsign). Others bark that such technology can’t replace a pilot and a chopper. ![]() Other readers assume that the station will start flying drones around as a replacement. Reddit readers have asked Campos what happened and he simply responds, “2020 happened”. In fact, you might have noticed that WTAE is touting “the only news helicopter in town” recently. It turns out that WPXI isn’t going to be using Chopper 11 for the time being. ![]() ![]() Turns out it wasn’t due to the quality of his work.
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