9/11 Anniversary Coverage

I suspect she says it later in the day at a TOTH, however just after Sky News report the crashed plane southeast of Pittsburgh (United 93) she does introduce a guest using the words "devastation in the north part of the eastern seaboard of the United States".

There's lots of anecdotal evidence of her using the phrase she is most attributed to, but I haven't found any video of it (and it may be that Sky News choose not to put that section on their website or replays of any coverage).

Very interesting stuff.

Especially this....


Classic TVF moment in times of important events.

Thanks Asa - very interesting stuff. Nowhere else would we be remembering the impact 9/11 had on Crossroads! Love too how towards the end of the thread thoughts shift from the victims and towards breaking the TV Forum record for longest thread - though I suspect the 26 pages was surpassed by the infamous "Newsreader in black" thread.

And concentrating on TV presentation itself it certainly was a landmark moment in terms of breaking news and rolling news and the way events unfolded that day certainly influenced how future events were covered - especially the long on screen shots of nothing happening, just in case something did.

I also think 9/11 was the beginning of the end for the ITN News Channel which had largely been a Headline News operation - on a day like that it made little sense for ITN and ITV News to be separate operations. Must say though one of the things I remember most from that day is Kirsty Young talking to her husband who was in New York at the time - that really highlighted how an unfolding national/international tragedy would be a personal tragedy for so many.


Back to todays events and I think on a day when America stands together it's pretty bad that Obama stands behind a bullet proof screen. Also interesting to see how ITV took the rememberence service on the Friday back then, but showed nothing of todays events live.

I was reading something on Wikipedia that stated that the US news channels all introduced tickers on that day and have never removed them. I think the same can be said of Sky News too. If not on the day then at some point soon afterwards. When did BBC News introduce their ticker? Did they wait for a rebrand or introduce it with their current graphics? Did BBC World and News 24 get them at the same time?

Certain things are notable from a presentation point of view in that thread

- BBC1 pushing the 'BBC News 24' brand while on BBC1, something they used to do a lot in those days
- Surprise when Huw Edwards turned up in the News 24 studio, unheard of back then but normal thesedays
- Charlie Stayt hosting Channel 5's coverage
- People questioning if the ITV1 'hearts' menu was shown in the Carlton regions
- A mention that Chris Moyles was running a sombre drivetime programme on Radio 1
- The Big Breakfast was dropped during the next morning
- Trisha was dropped on ITV1 on the 12th and there was a special live Kilroy

I remember that day like everyone else but presentationally one of the things that sticks out is Jeremy Thompson and Jon Snow in the days after, actually might have been the first anniversary on rooftops and the wind nearly blowing them away. Jeremy and maybe Jon also used commentators microphones which I remember for some reason.

David, I think I'm right in saying that News 24 didn't get a ticker until the December 2003 relaunch. I really can't remember a ticker being used during the 1999-2003 era. They just used astons back then.

Brekkie - you're absolutely right about 9/11 changing the format of rolling news. I think I started watching News 24 in 2000 and I can't remember an example of rolling coverage of the kind seen on 9/11. I agree that it was probably the event that heralded the start of a new era in 24-hour news broadcasting. Come to think of it, aside from Diana's death in 1997 (when BBC World was shown on BBC1) I can't remember a time before September 2001 when News 24 was shown on BBC1 or BBC2, aside from overnight simulcasts, of course. It was the start of a new era.

I've spent some time looking back at old news coverage from September 2001 and a couple of things came flooding back. Firstly, just how great both news graphics and music were back then. The BBC had the original and far superior David Lowe themes (particularly those fantastic special/sombre themes) and ITV News still had its very dramatic 1999 music in use. Everything used in 2011 pales in comparison.

Secondly, I recall that News 24 started using presenters on location during September 2001. For a period of two or three weeks there was a nightly newscast from Washington on both News 24 and World, which was presented (as I recall) by Richard Lister, Philippa Thomas, Nik Gowing or Gavin Esler. I don't have any recollection of such things happening regularly before then.

The person who posted on TVF to complain that Loose Women had been cancelled because of the live coverage of the Beslan siege always sticks in my mind.

Weekend 24 had started before then I think at 8am on a Saturday morning on BBC2 - this was before Breakfast became 7 days a week when BBC1 had the childrens programmes on a Saturday morning and Weekend 24 was slotted in around Open University programmes on BBC2

I'm not sure Sky had the ticker from Sept 11th. I thought the ITV News Channel was the first to have a permanent ticker from around early 2003 for it's War in Iraq coverage, with Sky not far behind at all - though perhaps they had used one on an ad-hoc basis beforehand.

Looking back also interesting to see a common theme of TV Forum over the last decade in that thread - ITV generally winning praise over the BBC. It looks like Sept 11th was one of the first big news events where the BBC just switched to News 24 rather than use the network team, and perhaps that's why 10 years on people seem to remember Kirsty Young on ITV a little bit more than the faces leading the BBC coverage. I might be reading the thread completely wrong and as I watched on ITV I can't recall first hand but the suggeston there is News 24 presenters were used through to the Six o'clock News, and Huw only joined the News 24 team after 7pm (I guess he was still the Six o'clock host back then).

Yes, Weekend 24 was a relic of the flags era on News 24 and you're right, it used to be simulcast on BBC1 on Saturday mornings. Sunday was branded Breakfast as I recall (post-October 2000, of course). What I meant was unscheduled rolling simulcasts of News 24 on BBCs 1 or 2. The routine overnight and breakfast simulcasts were well-established but I can't recall any impromptu simulcasts during the day to cover major news before 9/11 like we get fairly frequently these days.

Concorde crash in July 2000, and possibly the death of Jill Dando in 1999.