Raleigh News & Observer, Monday, December 27, 1999

Triangle media ready to report news on New Year's Eve

By RAH BICKLEY, Staff Writer

It isn't likely that the news media bending your ear about Y2K will have their broadcasts and presses crippled by the Year 2000 bug. Triangle television and radio stations and newspapers say their own computer systems are armed against any disruptions when the clock ticks into the new year -- one of the biggest news days of the century.

"We will be able to deliver all the news to our viewers over the weekend and beyond," said Bruce Gordon, president and general manager of WTVD Channel 11. "We don't believe we are going to have any Y2K problems. It's a big news night, and we will be fully staffed."

Radio stations The Light, WQOK and Foxy are ready too, said Hozie Mack, their operations director. Ditto for WRAL-TV Channel 5. WLFL-WB 22 and WRDC-UPN 28 say they're prepared too.

As for newspapers, both The News & Observer and The Durham Herald-Sun say readers definitely will find their paper outside the front door on New Year's morning. Both will be printed before midnight. Extra pages with breaking news about the turnover to the new century will be printed later and inserted.

Triangle media outlets say they'll have backup power generators at their studios and transmission sites and extra technical staff on duty. They'll also send competing teams of reporters swarming across the Triangle to cover everything from popping champagne corks to the glum night-shift workers at the convenience store. In the worst-case scenario of a power failure -- something the utility companies are declaring won't happen -- people will likely rely on battery-operated radios to get their news. Local TV stations say they could also broadcast over radio frequencies if need be, as they did during Hurricane Fran in 1996. The worst Y2K glitches are expected to occur abroad, not in the United States. So local TV stations and The Associated Press, a wire service that supplies national and international news to local newspapers and has a Raleigh office, will be watching updates from earlier time zones and reporting on any problems.

-- Old Git (anon@spamproblems.com), December 27, 1999

Answers

Where is Lee Kinard when you need him?

-- Willy (Wonka@thechocolatefactory.com), December 27, 1999.