Latest / Curtis Sliwa & Larry Mendte In The Morning / Tim Scheld, longtime NY radio reporter and WOR alum Interview

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Tim Scheld, longtime NY radio reporter and WOR alum Interview · Curtis Sliwa & Larry Mendte In The Morning

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Well, we are honored to be joined by Tim Scheld.
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: If you don't know the name, you're certainly going to
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: know the voice. He is a longtime New York radio
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: news reporter, an alum of WOR, but he's pretty well
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: known for his work at News Radio 88. He was
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: the news director there for two decades. He's been a
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  Speaker 1: journalist for five decades. He's covered every big story in
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: this in this city. As a matter of fact, he
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: does have a book out. That's not what we're talking
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: about today, but it's worth mentioning. My Front Row Seat,
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  Speaker 1: A Newsman's Journey.
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: And I would.
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  Speaker 1: Imagine September 11th, 2001 plays heavy in that book, Tim.
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  Speaker 1: And that's what we want to talk to you about today.
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: Thanks so much for joining us.
• 0:49
  Speaker 2: Hey, Larry. Thank you. That was sweet of you to say. Yeah.
• 0:52
  Speaker 3: I mean, honestly, September 11th, well, first of all, it's
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  Speaker 3: a day that none of us will ever forget it
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  Speaker 3: and not forget just for, you know, what we.
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: Saw or felt, but just how it felt.
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  Speaker 3: It feels so heavy even today as we look at
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  Speaker 3: the 25th anniversary.
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  Speaker 2: And, um, yeah, it was, uh, it's just amazing.
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  Speaker 3: It's overwhelming how many stories there are and how many
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  Speaker 3: we don't even still know.
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  Speaker 2: Um, I mean, I was looking at a Facebook feed just.
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  Speaker 3: A little while ago and saw a story of a
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  Speaker 3: guy that, um, was caught in the debris, but lived
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  Speaker 3: and I had never even heard his story.
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  Speaker 2: It's just amazing.
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  Speaker 3: What we went through as a city, as a community
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  Speaker 3: at a day when, you know, war was waged on us,
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  Speaker 3: you know.
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  Speaker 4: Now, Tim, this is Curtis Sliwa. On that day, I
• 1:38
  Speaker 4: was broadcasting. There was no internet. There was no feed.
• 1:43
  Speaker 4: When those towers went down, pretty much all TV channels
• 1:47
  Speaker 4: were off the air. People were dependent on radio as
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  Speaker 4: they've been enduring natural emergencies and blackouts. But I remember
• 1:55
  Speaker 4: all the misinformation, the rumors about that Flight 93 and
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  Speaker 4: where it was headed, and it crashed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania.
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  Speaker 4: But it was targeting the Capitol building. So they would
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  Speaker 4: have hit the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and the
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  Speaker 4: Capitol building. How, as a journalist, did you handle all
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  Speaker 4: those conspiracies when there was really no way to know
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  Speaker 4: what was going on?
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  Speaker 2: Well, hey, Curtis, it's good to hear your voice. Good
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  Speaker 2: to talk to you. I have to tell you, I.
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  Speaker 3: Do remember, and it was less rumors and misinformation and
• 2:30
  Speaker 3: more like things were coming out. So, for example, they
• 2:33
  Speaker 3: evacuated the Capitol. They evacuated areas around the White House
• 2:36
  Speaker 3: because they had heard a plane was still in the
• 2:39
  Speaker 3: air that they were not in contact with. That was
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  Speaker 3: Flight 93. Didn't really know the details about it. All
• 2:44
  Speaker 3: we knew is that they were evacuating places. And those
• 2:47
  Speaker 3: little bits of information were being delivered because there were
• 2:50
  Speaker 3: journalists in the Capitol that were evacuated. So that information
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  Speaker 3: made it on the air on radio and TV as
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  Speaker 3: we were doing seat-of-the-pants radio. I remember, and I was
• 3:02
  Speaker 3: just at the museum last week with my son. And
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  Speaker 3: this reminded me, on the Today Show, they didn't even
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  Speaker 3: know the plane had hit the Pentagon yet, but they
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  Speaker 3: were told by the producer, go to Jim Miklaszewski, the
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  Speaker 3: Pentagon reporter.
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  Speaker 2: He's got something to report. And Mick comes on the
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  Speaker 2: air and says, we just felt something. It was live
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  Speaker 2: action horror terror unfolding before our eyes. And it was
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  Speaker 2: an amazing day.
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  Speaker 3: And look, the first responders are the real heroes there
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  Speaker 3: and the people who weren't even uniformed, civilians that went
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  Speaker 3: into the building in a.
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  Speaker 2: Selfless act, but also the broadcasters that day.
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  Speaker 3: I do believe that the people who ran to the
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  Speaker 3: trouble to bring that information were heroes in.
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  Speaker 2: Their own right as well.
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  Speaker 1: Let's stay on that day for a second because you're
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  Speaker 1: overseeing news coverage. And as you just pointed out, information
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  Speaker 1: is coming at you fast and furious that you have
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  Speaker 1: to deal with and you have to respond to. Take
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: us through the day if you can.
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  Speaker 3: So, Larry, at that point, I was a national radio correspondent.
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  Speaker 3: Curtis probably remembers it, ABC News. So I was a
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  Speaker 3: reporter that day, and my day was, everybody in New
• 4:17
  Speaker 3: York probably forgets now, it was primary day. It was
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  Speaker 3: election day. So as a reporter, I was sleeping in.
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  Speaker 3: And I was running into the city late. So that
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  Speaker 3: probably saved me from being, you know, in the midst
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  Speaker 3: of the horror that quickly.
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  Speaker 2: But when I heard.
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  Speaker 3: The plane hit the tower, I knew that something was
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  Speaker 3: going on and I knew I had to get in
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  Speaker 3: the city. And my morning was spent struggling to try
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  Speaker 3: and find a way to get into Manhattan when it
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  Speaker 3: was closed down.
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  Speaker 2: Every highway was shut down. You couldn't get on by water.
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  Speaker 2: And I ended up.
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  Speaker 3: finding some sort of strategy with my wife and getting
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  Speaker 3: her to get me a bicycle and a helmet and, uh,
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  Speaker 3: meeting up here near Rockland County and taking the Tappan
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  Speaker 3: Zee bridge and getting to the Bronx and riding a
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  Speaker 3: bicycle into Manhattan, uh, to be there.
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  Speaker 2: And you're right.
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  Speaker 3: Managing that kind of chaos, um, is, um, there's no,
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  Speaker 3: there's no game plan. You've got to really sort of
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  Speaker 3: go by instinct. And, uh, what was really troubling is
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  Speaker 3: that we lost contact with a lot of our colleagues
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  Speaker 3: and friends when the towers came down. And no one
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  Speaker 3: knew the fate of many people. At WCBS, there was
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  Speaker 3: a well-known reporter, Mary Gay Taylor, and the towers came down.
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  Speaker 3: She was saved because somebody grabbed her and threw her
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  Speaker 3: underneath a vehicle that saved the two of them from
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  Speaker 3: getting hit by the debris.
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  Speaker 2: But nobody had heard from her for quite some time.
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  Speaker 2: And then about an hour later, they heard her voice
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  Speaker 2: and everybody was relieved. But that is a story that's.
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  Speaker 3: Told 10,000 times over by people who were looking for
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  Speaker 3: loved ones when they saw that horror happen on TV.
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  Speaker 4: You know, Tim, journalists get vilified often. But on that day,
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  Speaker 4: we were so dependent on you and others to get
• 6:01
  Speaker 4: us the information that we couldn't get for ourselves. what's
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  Speaker 4: the lesson to be learned about the role that journalists
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  Speaker 4: play in our day-to-day lives from that event?
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  Speaker 3: Well, I love the question, Curtis, and thank you. And
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  Speaker 3: I think that, you know, you know, the answer is that,
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  Speaker 3: you know, facts matter. Uh, and so you report what's
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  Speaker 3: in front of you and that'll never change. And I mean,
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  Speaker 3: that day obviously taught us that, um, you know, you
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  Speaker 3: really can, can report on what you see in front
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  Speaker 3: of you. And this idea of, uh, you know, rumors
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  Speaker 3: and misinformation, that stuff needs to be vetted. You can't
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  Speaker 3: report on things like that. And now there's so much information,
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  Speaker 3: like a fire hose of information, you know, headed our way.
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  Speaker 3: We've got to really teach the next generation of news
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  Speaker 3: consumers and journalists, for that matter, to think critically about
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  Speaker 3: the information in front of them before disseminating.
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  Speaker 2: Before you push share.
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  Speaker 3: On that, you know, on your Instagram post or on
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  Speaker 3: your feed, you really need to be confident that that
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  Speaker 3: information that you're sharing is accurate. And that's the real
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  Speaker 3: lesson that we all need to take from that.
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  Speaker 1: Well, very well said. Tim Scheld, longtime New York radio
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  Speaker 1: news reporter, WORLM alum, News Radio 88. He ran the
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: newsroom there for two decades. And his book is My
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: Front Row Seat, A Newsman's Journey. Thank you so much
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: for sharing all that with us, Tim.