our thoughts and prayers go out to the family of alison parker and the family of adam ward and to the family of wdbj, wdbj channel 7 is one of the big cbs affiliates in the country, and it s a great station here in our region, and so when we see these folks on tv, they become part of our life, and, of course, for me, yeah, i had just seen alison within the last couple of weeks, so they cover us in local government here in our region of virginia. you know, i see these pictures of the two of them and i love their smiles and as someone who is a reporter in virginia just a couple hours from you makes me heart smile to see how much they really enjoy their jobs and for people who don t realize who some of the smaller communities are like, and roanoke isn t that small,
ward and i are putting the final touches on our special report. alison grew up in martinsville and add am in salem. alison was a graduate of james madison university and loved the outside. in salem, adam ward, news 7 sports. and add am attended salem high school where he played football, a virginia tech graduate and big hokies fan. alison worked at a station in jacksonville, north carolina before she returned to wdbj 7 in 2014. adam had been here for four years, first as an employee of our production department and more recently as a photographer in news. he and alison had been working together on wdbj 7 morning a little over a year covering everything from community events to breaking news, and they did it well. and both of them had fallen in love with co-workers. adam was engaged to our morning producer melissa ott. they were planning their wedding
of alison parker and add am ward and they had done a number of broadcasts over the years and we re saddened today. miss gardner was broke to the hospital this morning by hospital and is currently in stable condition. i don t have any further information at this point in time, but i would encourage you to check back with us as we get further along in the situation. thank you. would you say anything about the nature of her injury? unfortunately, i can t. i don t have that information right now. okay. just wanted to make sure we heard from him before we pull away from this. really the headline other than such a tremendous loss in this community, head line is that this gunman, bryce williams is what he went by on air, legal name vester flanagan, 41 years of age, i m sorry, i m hearing a voice in my ear. would you like me to go back there. i m going to continue until i m
hour something that hits extraordinarily close to home for so many of us having grown up in journalism. i just absolutely feel for these two young lives, two individuals who were murdered as it was captured on live television this morning, two young beloved employees at wdbj in roanoke, virginia and just, again, pausing to send my condolences to the newsroom there into the families of both of these young people, two young journalists, 24-year-old alison parker and 27-year-old adam ward shot and killed while they were doing what they loved, telling stories in their communities and they were shot and killed by a man, a former reporter, disgruntled employee at this very same space. legally his name vester flanagan on the air went by the name bryce williams. we ve now heard from law enforcement that he died at 1 31:30 p.m. eastern after turning the gun on himself, eluding police,
know what it s like to have that special job in tv and had that special relationship with co-workers so i m so sorry for you. how did you learn about this? i worked overnight. i checked my phone and i had so many messages and i m like did you hear the news? i checked twitter and just seeing wdbj trending which is heartbreaking and then knowing, like seeing the faces of alison and add am. i just can t put it into words like how it felt. can you tell me about them? let s start with alison. oh, when i worked there, alison was an intern and was kind of like the super intern of the group. she s very polished, bright. she like had such a zest for news industry. adam, he like everyone was saying in the newsroom he s such