Better late than never… it’s taken a while to recover from the coverage of Hurricane Irene.

Taking Facebook questions from viewers the day before the storm hit

Remember the week started with extensive coverage of the earthquake? Some folks were posting on Facebook asking what it was like for us here at the station before, during, and after the storm. So, I’m going to  try to sum it up for you with pictures and words.

WAVY/FOX43 Newsroom during hurricane coverage

We knew the storm was coming so we had a plan in place to have folks here on Saturday, August 27.  Even those with planned vacations changed those plans to be around. WAVY and Fox 43  was staffed not only with the producers, photographers, production crew, on air and web staff who normally work Monday through Friday, but we also had help from other departments. Our General Manager, Doug Davis, sat on the assignment desk and answered viewer phone calls.

Crew from our sister station WOOD-TV about to go live outside

We even had staff come in from our sister stations WOOD-TV in Grand Rapids and WISH-TV in Indianapolis to help us. Everyone pulled together and pitched in. Many of us did jobs we don’t normally do.

Downloading pictures from Reportit@WAVY.com

As we stayed on the air and online for hours to get the information out, the water continued to rise outside our studios in Portsmouth.

"Lake WAVY" outside our station

“Lake WAVY” is always a good indicator of how bad the storm is. The station had food for us and some of us brought in our own goodies and since we never lost power we were able microwave different items.

Nicole's dinner during Irene

There were a lot of snacks around, so I think I can speak for most and say we blew our diets during the non-stop coverage.

Storm snacks

Nicole's nap space

As for sleep, I took a 2 and a half hour nap in the closet near the Sport Department (also known as Mr. Rader’s dressing room)   Stephanie Harris and I were on the air Sunday morning at 5 to bring viewers the latest since our overnight break. I was able to go home at about 11am where I did some laundry, straightening up, reading mail and other errands before I crashed for about 4 hours! Then, it was back to the station to anchor the 10pm news on Fox 43 TV.

WAVY meteorologists hard at work

I’ve covered a few big storms during my career, but this is the most memorable when it comes to seeing people work together for long hours to get important information out. And it seems our viewers were happy with the product on tv,  on the radio, and online.

Letter to Va. Pilot editor about WAVY's storm coverage

We received letters, Facebook posts and emails thanking us for our hard work. Thank you for getting your news from 10 On Your Side and First on Fox 43! We’ll be here for you for the next storm, too!