Sometimes no story is the best story
By Carrie Click
Post Independent Staff
No news is good news, at least in the case of a reported airplane crash at the Garfield County Airport.
Wednesday morning about 9:30 a.m., while driving to work westbound on Interstate 70, I got off at the Garfield County Airport exit between Rifle and Silt to take a few photographs.
As I pulled up to the stop sign at the end of the off-ramp, I saw a fire engine pulling out and two or three sheriff’s vehicles, flashing lights on.
A reporter usually doesn’t come across a scene like this. Usually, our newsroom scanner will alert us to an event that would elicit this kind of reaction.
But being the reporter that I am, I thought I better find out what was going on, so I parked and ran over to a group of sheriff’s deputies standing in a circle on the side of the road.
I immediately recognized Garfield County Sheriff Lou Vallario – and him, me – and asked him what was up.
no story: see next page
no story: from previous page
“Oh, we had a call this morning from a woman who saw a plane flying low,” Vallario said. “She said it looked like it crashed, and she saw smoke.”
But when the sheriff’s department contacted the Garfield County Airport tower, the news was good news: the plane in question had landed safely, and the smoke the woman saw was unrelated and not a danger to anyone or anything.
“That’s great,” I told the officers. “What good news.”
“And it’s such a beautiful morning, we decided to have a little meeting while we were out here anyway,” Vallario added.
Many times in the newsroom, the news we report on is sad, bad news – car wrecks, fires, injuries and accidents – things people didn’t expect to be involved in, ever.
This time, it just plain felt good to come upon a scene that looked like it could potentially be the subject of a story with a tragic ending, and find that just the opposite had taken place.
Contact Carrie Click: 945-8515, ext. 518
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