you know what’s crazy? I’ll tell you what’s crazy™
A twin prop airplane crash in Nashville.
4 people are dead.
Body parts are severed, scattered, lost in the nearby woods.
There is fire and spilled aviation fuel.
I will call it controlled chaos.
Controlled in that rescue crews are everywhere and the scene is under control. Chaos in that heads and hands and legs are all over the parking lot and the scene is in total confusion.
Controlled Chaos? The sentence apparently irks one viewer who emails me later to tell me that there is nothing chaotic about it.
I feel like arguing with this viewer, but why.
He is home, warm, with time to burn.
This schmuck has even sent me the Merriam Webster definition of chaos.
I should pull down my pants and send him an iphone shot of my ass.
I think better of it.
I am at the top of the driveway overlooking the scene. 4 people are confirmed dead. The scene is a blanket of red swirling lights slicing through the heavy fog on this 30 degree night.
I am glad I don’t have seizure disorder. So many flashing lights, so many blinking lights, strobing lights, lights punching my pupils like tiny boxers. It is hard not to feel disoriented, lost in the lights of the tragedy.
This is a painful disaster to be sure. It could have been so much worse.
When the call 1st goes out, we initially think the plane has slammed into a neighborhood. Within minutes the scanner traffic indicates it may have hit the YMCA. We quickly learn that the pilot banked hard right and put the twin-engine aircraft nose first into a grassy noll, some 40 feet from the building that houses the pool.
An entire family of people perished in the blink of life’s eye.
There was a fire. A few cars were damaged. It could have been so much worse.
I have seen so much worse.
DATELINE: Greenville, N.C.
It’s 1993. It’s sweltering hot.
The air in Eastern North Carolina is so thick you can floss your teeth with it.
It’s wet like a wash cloth. It’s uncomfortable like meeting your prom date’s dad.
These disasters frequently begin the same way.
It’s a quiet morning, then suddenly all hell breaks loose.
The scanner blares in my office. “Plane crash on such and such road.”
It’s like dropping a mason jar full of quarters on a marble floor.
It is loud and abrupt and it gets your attention.
I stop doing whatever it is I am doing.
I toss the mayor’s ribbon cutting press release onto the floor and spring out the door.
I jump into my news unit and head toward the river.
I see a column of smoke rising over the trees.
I am driving by braille, back and forth, grinding the tires into the hot asphalt, chasing a smoke stream in the sky.
It’s an unsafe way to drive. Nobody ever said that driving a News vehicle to a spot news scene is going to be or is supposed to be safe.
You want safe?
Go wipe down the pew of your local church.
You want balls to the wall?
Get in the passenger seat with me on the way to a plane crash.
I am like an Indian scout, following a trail in the sky. But I am unclear how to get to the woods, to the river, wherever this crash has happened.
It is not on an accessible road. It is between the river and the woods.
The scanner in my news unit is screaming with intensity, like an Ex Wife who is demanding her late alimony check.
I come to the end of the road.
It’s a dead-end. I am at a tobacco field.
Damn.
I stare at the column of smoke rising over the trees at the back of the tobacco field.
The news is there. And I am stuck here.
If only I was an eagle, I could soar over this problem and see what my journalistic soul is pushing me to go see.
The field before me is hundreds of yards long. Way off in the distance, like tiny Tonka Trucks, I see fire units at the base of the woods.
They are small, but the glowing red lights jump into my pupils.
All my life, the swirling lights have been an attraction, like a chewed stogie to Clint Eastwood’s lips.
I look to the right. I look to the left.
Should I?
Damn right I should.
I tighten my grip on the steering wheel and punch it.
The news car launches off the road and into the tobacco field.
Suddenly I am flying over tilled soil that rises 2 feet and then dips down 2 feet.
I see tobacco plants being spit up in my rear view.
I should feel sorry for the tobacco farmer whose plants I am ruining.
I don’t.
I quickly decide he is a purveyor of cancer and I secretly hate him and know he deserves this.
Ha Ha.
Instant rationalization. It is the soul’s medicine.
The shock absorbers are screaming like a baby in church as the tires hit each dirt mound.
If I wasn’t wearing a seat belt, I would be tossed out of the car like a champagne cork blown out of a bottle in the retro burn of the space shuttle.
I see the horizon violently dip and then rise and then dip again.
It’s a violent spin cycle of bad driving and aggressive news gathering.
My fillings are coming undone, my shirt untucked, my glasses falling off my face, as dust fills the cockpit of the vehicle.
After a spine snapping drive, that will require massage therapy from a licensed professional, I arrive at the edge of the field.
Smoke and dust rise up around me as I skid to a halt.
I love to make an entrance.
I jump out and cough up a brown colored dirt loogey. It’s unpleasant, but necessary for the respiratory process.
I grab my Ikegami camera and 3/4 inch record deck and move to the fire fighters and rescue personnel.
Many of them are angry, eye balling me like the Hatfields once eyed the McCoys.
“What’s going on fellas?” I say trying to assuage the awkward moment.
“You can’t be here,” a man wearing a fire jacket says with a scowl.
“why not?” I respond.
“It’s a search and rescue operation. The media staging area is up there.”
He points to a ledge a million miles away.
My heart sinks.
Before I can state my case, an authoritative voice in the back chimes in.
“He made it this far. He can come with us.”
It’s the Greenville Fire Chief.
Out here, he is God and his word just stamped my journalistic passport.
The man in the coat snarls, but remains silent.
The chief walks up to me.
“We got a single engine down in the woods, back in the swamp. 6 Souls reportedly on board.”
“Ok,” I say gulping and getting my gear together.
Suddenly a machine belonging to the forestry department rolls into position. It is loud and ferocious as it begins to chew a path for the rescuers.
The machine nudges up to a tree and then slowly drives over a young sapling.
Snap.
The tree breaks and the machine moves it out-of-the-way, then proceeds to knock the next tree down.
Snap.
The search and rescue teams follow behind the machine as it cuts a path into the woods.
The broiling air of the Carolina summer is sweltering.
You would think that entering the woods would be cooler due to the shade, but it is actually hotter.
It is a sauna of stagnant air. It’s like sleeping in Rosie O’Donnels arm pits after a power walk.
The woods are thick with starving mosquitoes the size of your thumb. They are attracted to our body heat, our sweat. Like tiny vampires they want to drink our blood, to open up a vein and gorge themselves till they puke hemoglobin.
Suddenly the ground grows soft, marshy and we are walking into the swamp.
My high tops are gone. Then my socks. Suddenly I am walking in bog up to my knees.
The water is the color of dark cement. I have no idea where I am stepping.
I try to move at a regular pace, but each shoe sticks in the bog like Gorilla Glue.
I pull my foot up with great effort.
It’s like quick sand.
There is a sucking slurping sound.
I place my foot back down and my foot is swallowed by clay and Earth that hasn’t been disturbed for ions.
I look up and see the Pitt County deputies clutching their side arms.
“Why the gun deputy?” I ask.
“Snakes,” he says his gaze never leaving the swamp we are wading through.
The walk is torturous. It is hot like the Devil’s furnace. The bugs are thick and gross and hungry for sweat and blood. Moving is arduous, almost impossible.
Snakes?
I don’t like snakes.
Why am I here? I ask myself several times, my muscles aching from carrying 50 pounds of camera gear into a swamp.
Suddenly the smell of jet fuel and death fill the air.
I am reminded of my grisly task.
“We’re close,” the chief says.
“Be careful not to disturb anything” he adds
We have made our way to an island of solid ground. The trees are tall all around us. The canopy of leaves is lush and forms a thatched roof above our heads. The sun’s rays can barely penetrate the thick dense cathedral of death.
As we get closer, I see the wings are broken and tossed to the side. Suitcases and belongings are scattered about. The fuselage is burning, stuck in the trees about 8 feet off the ground. The people are belted in, upside down. They are dead, charred beyond recognition.
I can see their lifeless bodies in the windows that are either broken or missing. It’s as if a Hollywood make up artist staged the scene. The bodies look like a movie. It is so perfect, so horrible, they almost seem fake.
The men move to the fuselage and blasts it with fire extinguishers.
The flames slowly die, choking on the thick white dust.
It’s hard to breathe. The air is hot and stagnant. The only oxygen is laced with fire extinguisher dust and jet fuel.
And the trees are dripping with death.
I hear buzzards squawk over head.
I raise my camera and zoom into the fuselage where I see a close up of the charred remains of a human in my black and white view finder.
It’s hard to look at. But in black and white, it almost has a cinematic, artistic quality. I am strangely drawn to the image.
I don’t know why I’m shooting it.
I know I can’t air it on tv.
Still I am fascinated.
I have never been to a plane crash. Now I am at a plane crash with 6 dead people, burned, possibly dismembered, hanging from a tree.
It’s horrific, but at the same time journalistically exhilarating.
“They’re all dead, one of the men says. “It’s a recovery.”
And with that, the realization of the job description pivots on a dime.
Life is lost. Now the heavy lifting begins.
“OK. let’s get the boats in here from the river,” the chief says.
I have all I need. I walk back with the sheriff’s deputies and a contingent of fire fighters.
The return trip is hot and horrible. We are dehydrated and exhausted.
I can’t swear to this in court, but I am certain that a deputy saw a snake and shoots at it.
By the time I get to the tree line, I feel the sun explode against my skin.
I am covered with mud. I am panting as if I have run a marathon.
There is a ridge a hundred yards away where the road and the farm come together.
I look for the live truck masts.
I see several.
I get in my car and drive through the tobacco field to a dirt road.
I get out of my car and eject the tape.
I remember walking toward a horde of waiting media.
By this time all the stations from Greenville have assembled at the media zone.
This story must be big. Members of the Raleigh Durham market are there as well.
I walk up to my live truck as my friends, my competitors all smile.
These are my friends. We compete against each other, but we also drink after work with each other. We know one another and care for each other even though I wear a 7 on my sleeve and some of them have 12’s and 9’s.
Some of my friends start to clap for me.
I’ll never forget this moment, this magnificent gesture.
Better than anyone, they understand the magnitude of this moment.
On this particular day, for this particular newscast, this is a colossal exclusive.
While they have been staring at the woods from the road, wondering what is beyond the tree line, what is that smoke billowing up into the sky, I have been to the belly of the beast.
I have tasted death, seen the inner sanctum, visited with the reaper and now I am back to reveal my findings.
I look a mess. I am covered with sweat, dirt and mud.
I toss the 3/4 inch tape to the waiting live truck operator.
“Where should I cue it?” he says.
“Go to the burning fuselage in the tree. Be careful not to show the bodies.”
“Got it,” he shouts.
“Everyone dead?” a friend asks.
“yes. It’s horrific,” I say.
I put on my IFB and stand before the camera near the truck.
I exhale trying to regain my composure.
I am exhausted, aching, almost nauseous.
The producer talks in my ear.
“We’re coming to you out of the commercial.”
“OK”
“Can you wipe your face? You’re covered with mud.”
I touch my face. It is caked and hard. I feel like I have been through some aboriginal right of passage.
“No. I think this is just fine. Everyone in there looks like this.”
“OK, your call he says. 30 seconds.”
A photographer from the Raleigh station lays at my feet so he can see my monitor. Others go to the live truck and watch the video being micro waved back to the main station in Little Washington.
“Oh my god,” I hear one reporter exclaim.
“How the hell did you get in there?” a buddy of mine asks.
Just then the voice in my ear counts me down.
“Cue.”
I begin talking. I haven’t got a thing prepared. I just tell the story of the horrific journey into the woods and the swamp and the snakes and then the plane full of dead bodies and burned body parts.
“Wrap.”
“For Eastern Carolina’s News Channel, I’m Andy Cordan”
“Clear.”
It feels like a special moment.
I made something remarkable happen.
I forced myself into the action, accompanied the responders and went on a mission that no other reporter in the market achieved.
Members of the Raleigh media group were pissed and demanded to be brought into the crash scene.
By 6pm, everyone visually has what I had exclusively at noon.
But they didn’t really earn it. They were taken into the scene by the river on john boats.
That’s like riding to work in the back of a limo asking someone if they have any Gray Poupon Mustard.
Noon? Well, noon was extraordinary.
It was horrific. It was memorable. It was a news man being a news man.
20 years later, standing a half mile away on this frozen hill in Nashville, I think about that Greenville, N.C. day.
I wish it were that warm. I am shivering.
I am no where close to the crash. I have none of the access I had in 1993. I don’t feel this story, I can’t smell this story, I can’t taste this story.
If only one of the Metro cops would unholster his weapon and shoot something.
Alas, that will not happen on this frigid night.
I will report the crash. Four people dead. It is sad. The pilot did a great job not to fly into a house or the YMCA.
It was a terrible story.
So was the death of 6 people in a Pitt County swamp 21 years ago.
The same. But somehow, so different.
Life’s crazy™