Just when you think everything is running smoothly, a higher authority is there to yank your chain to remind you who is in charge. No, I'm not talking about the folks in the front office, this time, I'm talking about Mother Nature.

For those folks who read this who don't live in Wichita Falls, Tuesday night, we had a huge wind storm! The storm started building a little before 10:00 PM in the northern part of Oklahoma. It stretched west into Texas. It was actually along the leading edge of a cool front that was moving into our area. As the storm built, it was feeding off of the heat and humidity that was generated in Texoma all day Tuesday. The closer it got, the more force the storm picked up. Finally when it reached our area, winds were steady in the 70 to 80 mile per hour range. The strongest gust hit 94 miles per hour at Sheppard Air Force Base at the weather reporting station.

Let it suffice to say, there was wide spread damage across town along with widespread power outages. Fortunately, no injuries were reported. There was one problem, KAUZ lost power suddenly. And when you have a business that is dependent on electricity to run the transmitter, computers, studio cameras and everything else that needs electric juice, when the power is out, you are dead in the water!

That's the set up. What I actually want to brag about is how the News Channel 6 team pulled together. I'm not just talking about the news staff either. I actually slept through the storm but got a call about 3:45 AM from someone calling to tell me, "Here's what's going on, but oh, by the way, we've got it under control and we just wanted you to know that." I have been at some places where had today's events happened, I would have walked into mass chaos with nothing having been done.

But morning anchor Lindsay Hunt, was already here and was working with a flash light in the front part of the building, making calls to the electric company on her cell phone to police and whoever else she needed to get to for information. The producer, Katy Pool, was here patiently waiting for the power to come back on to be able to reboot computers and forge into the morning newscast. Jackie McCartney, our promotions director was even here to help. I already had a photographer on the streets shooting the damage. The chief engineer was here working with the electric utility, the studio camera person was also here ready to spring into action along with the technical director and audio person. The general manager was here to oversee it all.

When I got here we got Barry Mahler, our Farm and Ranch Director to get with one of our radio partners, Joe Tom White, to get the word out on the radio about what we were experiencing. I even shot some stills with a digital camera and wrote a story for the internet to let our viewers know about what was happening, but I had to run home to post it. Thank God for the internet and not being tied to one location for posting material. Many times, when viewers see or hear about stormy weather, our website (kauz.com) is one of the first places they go to get a look at our Live Doppler 6000 radar. There were shots of storm damage and a story detailing our situation.

Our day wasn't without it's problems, when you loose power abruptly, it can scramble computers, cause equipment to get out of phase and look funny on air, and even fry some equipment. But my point is, we worked closely together to correct those problems and move on to the next thing.

As the morning pressed onward, the power was restored just before 8:00 AM, and all the while, I was getting calls from reporters checking in offering up ideas on how to mold our coverage for the day.

I can say without reservation, we have a great team here and as evidenced today, when a crisis arises, I wouldn't want any other group of people around.