Reporter Gets Hit By Car, Continues Reporting But Concerns Grow Over Risks Faced

Tori Yorgey, a reporter who works for West Virginia-based news channel WSAZ-TV was hit by a running car while she was on air covering a story. Yorgey received minor injuries but finished her broadcast.

https://twitter.com/bubbaprog/status/1484027271753183234?s=20

While Yorgey’s dedication to her job gained her accolades as well as eye-grabbing headlines from some top US media outlets, the focus has now shifted on what safety measures local news organizations are taking to address issues related to safety of reporters working in those outlets.

https://twitter.com/toriyorgeytv/status/1484297416853577734?s=20

Yorgey’s video went viral where she was hit by an approaching car while standing on the pavement – footpath – and managed to focus the camera on her and continue the newscast. “Oh my God, I just got hit by a car, but I’m OK. I just got hit by a car, but I’m OK, Tim,” Yorgey said to news anchor Tim Irr live on TV, after being hit. She reportedly is doing well and according WSAZ-TV reported soreness.

A report by the news agency the New York Times pointed out that some reporters highlighted that the practice of sending a ‘one-man band’ for covering news stories is perilous. ‘One-man band’ is a journalistic practice in the United States where reporters are often sent to cover stories with a camera and all by themselves. The report also quoted a journalism professor from the University of North Carolina’s Hussman School of Journalism and Media in Chapel Hill in North Carolina who told the news agency that the practice of ‘one-man band’ is more widespread. Reporters are often required to report on natural disasters, mass shootings and gruesome crimes by themselves and the professor said that local media houses need to cut back on this practice.

CA Tuggle, the professor also commented on Yorgey’s newsbreak – a water main break, along Roxalana Hills Drive in Dunbar at Roxalana Hills Apartments – and said that the employers should reflect if it was necessary for her to cover this and that too by herself. Another former media worker told the NYT that for local media houses in the US it was all about cutting back on costs which forces them to send reporters out alone without a crew.

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