Earlier this week, I wrote a story profiling the efforts of KNOE, the Gray-owned CBS affiliate in Monroe, in covering the devastating flooding there, where more than 24 inches of rain fell in just a few days last week. And subsequently, I did an article about KNOE holding a telethon to raise money to help […]
Earlier this week, I wrote a story profiling the efforts of KNOE, the Gray-owned CBS affiliate in Monroe, in covering the devastating flooding there, where more than 24 inches of rain fell in just a few days last week.
And subsequently, I did an article about KNOE holding a telethon to raise money to help flood victims and another on how much they were able to collect and donate to the American Red Cross there.
In the course of writing the original story, I learned about an incident where 3 people from KNOE were out in a flooded neighborhood when the pirogue they were sitting in capsized, throwing all three of them into the flood waters.
Although I did mention that in the original story, I was curious about that and so I contacted Dr. Nicole Cross to ask about falling off the boat.
(Yes, yet another fascinating angle to this story is that Dr. Cross, before she was a journalist and anchor on the morning and noon news on KNOE, ran a successful psychotherapy practice providing mental health counseling).
Cross says neither she nor Danielle Beckford, the producer of Good Morning ArkLaMiss, were supposed to be working that day.
Both were there in the neighborhood to witness first-hand what was going on in their community and to supplement the footage that Aaron Cantrell, KNOE’s general assignment reporter, was collecting.
All three were shooting b-roll and standups (or sit downs) with their iPhones. All of the video in the story was shot via their iPhones.
“We had the wherewithal to know not to bring the station camera,” said Cross.
“We didn’t want to risk the big cameras out there, but we didn’t consider risking our own iPhones. It’s so funny, we were more concerned about the cameras than our own selves.”
The three were in a Monroe trailer park community being pulled around in a pirogue by one of the residents wearing hip waders.
“It was the three of us on the boat,” said Cross, “and he was guiding us in. We shot some video there, taped some standups, and then we were making our way out. I don’t know what happened. Our boat was just so small and rickety, something happened, I don’t know if one repositioned or was it me waving at residents, something made us uneven and before we knew it we were in the water, and I went all the way in, hair, everything, and we all were trying to hold the iPhones up.”
She laughed at the thought of it all.
“After we fell in, we’re like OK, we’re going to be OK, and after that, we just stood up and continued on. We were in shock. And can’t believe that just happened, and I said ‘well, we don’t need the boat any more’.”
Cross said they had “no intention of sharing this story but it just kind of circulated and I shared the picture that we took afterwards.”
Cross said there were other residents who witnessed them falling into the flood waters.
“When I posted the picture, (on Facebook), two people who were there commented, and said ‘oh, they didn’t freak out, they’re so professional’.”
Cross edited together this video specifically for Market Share, using the standups they recorded after falling into the water, and including the actual video of them going into water, none of which has been seen anywhere other than inside KNOE.
“The video is pretty hilarious. It’s just in the moment.”
After falling into the water, Cross continued on, soaking wet, to one of the shelters where she was scheduled to meet some Facebook friends who were donating items for victims.
“I had to quickly dry off, blow dry my hair and get to the shelter. I was there in the shelter, put my shirt in the dryer, and my jeans were still wet, nobody knew about that, and we just delivered items to the victims at the shelter.”
Cross said Cantrell, KNOE’s general assignment reporter, had to go to a local firehouse to cover a breaking news story about a fire. When he got there, the fire chief took one look at him and asked him why he was so wet.
“So nothing stopped. We just went on,” said Cross.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AMj9DMfMJFY&feature=em-upload_owner
Comments (0)
Reader Interactions