[Scan-DC] Newsroom Scanners (Frederick, Md.)

[Alan Henney]

The Frederick News-Post (Maryland)

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Business News

June 30, 2012 Saturday

The Frederick News-Post, Md., Rob Walters column

BYLINE: Rob Walters, The Frederick News-Post, Md.

SECTION: STATE AND REGIONAL NEWS

LENGTH: 551 words

June 30--A working newsroom has its own music -- the clickety-clack of keyboards, the warble of telephones and the awkward chords of the copy machine.

Some sounds have vanished over the years. Gone are the teletype machines that ticked like a metronome, and sometimes rang like church bells to flag news BULLETINS or a news FLASH.

One constant sound remains, though: the police scanner. 

The black boxes constantly chirp from two different corners of the newsroom, providing background noise throughout the day and night.

Visitors to the newsroom sometimes ask how we can stand to work with scanner noise in the background. To be honest, you really do not hear the scanner -- that is, until something catches your ear.

The best reporters and photographers develop what I call "scanner ear." Chief Photographer Sam Yu has it. So does photographer Bill Green, another seasoned veteran.

Yu actually sleeps with his police scanner on at home, his ear so fine-tuned to wake him up at the hint of news. He tells the story of waking up to scanner chatter the night the D.C. snipers were spotted at a rest stop near Myersville.

Yu was among the first, if not the first, members of the media on scene that night.

You never know what you will hear on the scanner. Working at a newspaper in California, I once heard a fire department dispatch for a "plane versus pony."

Another time I heard a fire assistance call of "help a man get a woman into bed." Ahem. I believe they were talking about someone who had fallen.

News-Post staff writer Patti Borda jots down interesting calls she hears over the scanner. Here is a sampling from her collection:

-- "The weapon is a tree trimmer."

-- "Man in orange construction vest and cowboy boots walking around neighborhood attempting to sell a mortgage."

-- "Bear entering residence."

-- "Whoa! When I say whoa, I mean whoa."

-- "Infant locked in a residence, nonemergency." --

-- "Subject is schizophrenic, delusional, believes he owns a chain of fast-food restaurants." --

-- "Report of an at-large Chihuahua in the area."

-- "Has short hair in a ponytail, wearing one black shoe, SpongeBob backpack."

-- "A son is putting toothpaste in a daughter's hair."

-- "I'm confused: Where are we at, and what are we doing? I apologize; I'm calling the wrong place."

Part of developing scanner ear sort of means learning a second language. That's because fire and police officials speak using Ten Codes. For example, we sometimes hear "multiple 10-32s in the house" -- which is a reference to guns.

How we deploy reporters and photographers depends on the type of scanner call. If the call is for a structure fire, we wait until a first responder reaches the scene and radios back a description. Often, a call for a structure fire turns out to be insignificant or a false alarm.

On the other hand, reporters and photographers move immediately if the call is along the lines of an explosion or plane crash.

Some readers have police scanners, and they tip us to something we have missed. Have a scanner? Let us know what you hear at citydesk at newspost.com

We're listening.

Rob Walters is the assistant managing editor for The Frederick News-Post.

___ (c)2012 The Frederick News-Post (Frederick, Md.) Visit The Frederick News-Post (Frederick, Md.) at www.fredericknewspost.com Distributed by MCT Information Services