News Comes to Me

As a journalist, I always need to go where the action is. Not a problem, obviously, but it would be easier if everything just landed in my lap.

Yesterday, a sleepy Sunday, it did. It was 6 a.m., and I was already groggily up, checking e-mail in my home office in St. Albans, Vt.  I thought I heard a dull "thud" outside. Then a slightly louder thud. Then, looking out the window behind the laptop on my desk,  I thought I saw a little patch of gray smoke float by.

Firefighters in St. Albans on Sunday battle a truck fire
in which a woman rescued the driver 

I went outside and looked. There was a big pall of black smoke. Oops. A story.

So I grabbed my camera, hopped in the truck and followed the smoke. And the fire trucks. It turns out a tractor trailer truck burst into flames at a truck stop just a mile from my house. Luckily, I was able to get some nice dramatic photos and a cool story for the Burlington Free Press.

Yes, I do sound too enthusiastic about this. After all, fires are dangerous. But in this case, nobody got hurt, and a woman was hailed as a hero for rescuing the truck driver.