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Some stories don't wait for a commercial break. Join us as we count down the most harrowing moments where live news broadcasts were shattered by sudden, unscripted, and often tragic events that left viewers in total disbelief. From shocking assassinations to devastating disasters, these are the broadcasts that changed television history forever.
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00:00Well, if you're wondering what's happened, so am I.
00:03Actually, the computer that we have running our news from time to time took off and went wild.
00:07Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're looking at harrowing instances where news broadcasts were disrupted by sudden, unscripted, and often
00:15tragic events that left audiences in total disbelief.
00:18Viewer discretion is strongly advised, as many of the entries in this video contain graphic and sensitive content.
00:23But, you know, you see it playing on the news and it's just like, that's my neighbor, you know, and
00:28it's still unbelievable.
00:30Lee Harvey Oswald murdered by Jack Ruby.
00:33From Dallas, Texas, the flash, apparently official, President Kennedy died at 1 p.m. Central Standard Time, 2 o'clock
00:43Eastern Standard Time, some 38 minutes ago.
00:48The assassination of President John F. Kennedy just two days prior had already plunged the United States into a state
00:54of profound national grief and shock.
00:56It was against this backdrop on November 24th, 1963, that Lee Harvey Oswald, the man accused of Kennedy's murder, was
01:04being transferred from Dallas Police Headquarters to the county jail.
01:08He's been shot. He's been shot.
01:11Cameras from multiple networks were rolling, capturing every detail of this highly anticipated moment.
01:16From the throngs of reporters and onlookers, nightclub owner Jack Ruby lunged forward.
01:21In a split second, a single shot ran out, striking Oswald in the abdomen and instantly making American history.
01:28The dingy little strip club run by Jack Ruby, the man who killed the president's assassin, has been closed for
01:33nearly a year now.
01:34Ruby himself, under sentence of death, is in the county jail awaiting the hearing of his appeal.
01:39Christine Chubbuck takes her own life.
01:41In Sarasota, Florida today, a 29-year-old talk show hostess shot herself in the head live on television.
01:47The woman, Christine Chubbuck, was taken to the hospital in critical condition.
01:52Ms. Chubbuck wrote and starred in a half-hour daily show called the Suncoast Digest on station WXLT-TV.
01:59On July 15th, 1974, Christine Chubbuck, a news reporter for WXLT-TV in Sarasota, Florida, began her program, Suncoast Digest.
02:08After reporting on a shooting from the previous day, Chubbuck looked directly into the camera and made the following statement.
02:14In keeping with Channel 40's policy of bringing you the latest in blood and guts and in living color, you're
02:20going to see another first.
02:22She then pulled out a .38 caliber revolver from beneath her desk and shot herself.
02:27The station cut to a public service announcement, but it was too late.
02:30The horrific act had already transpired live on air.
02:33Chubbuck was pronounced dead, age 29, 14 hours later.
02:37Thank you all for being here, and thanks for discussing this with me.
02:41Good day.
02:42Gary Plouch kills Jeffrey Doucette.
02:44Jeffrey Paul Doucette was a karate instructor in Baton Rouge, and on February 19th, he kidnapped one of his students,
02:5012-year-old Jody Ploche.
02:52One week later, Doucette telephoned the boy's mother, June Ploche, and demanded she fly to New York to meet him
02:58and bring her three other children with her,
03:00if she ever expected to see Jody alive again.
03:03Gary Plouch, a Louisiana father, had been searching for Jeffrey Doucette, the man who had kidnapped and sexually abused his
03:09son.
03:10On March 16th, 1984, local news crews were present at the Baton Rouge Metropolitan Airport, expecting to capture footage of
03:17Doucette's extradition back to Louisiana.
03:19And then, so, when they brought him back, my father, with the knowledge that Jeff was going to be at
03:23the airport at this particular time,
03:25he had the gun in his boot, he called his best friend from the payphone, and they made a video
03:31that y'all were celebrating 40 years later on Father's Day.
03:34Amidst the scrum of reporters and police officers, Doucette, handcuffed and shackled, was being escorted across the terminal.
03:41Then, in a sudden, explosive turn of events, Gary Plouch emerged from the crowd near a bank of payphones.
03:48He approached Doucette and shot him point-blank in the head.
03:51The entire chilling sequence was broadcast live to stunned audiences by local ABC affiliate WBRZ-TV.
03:58The Challenger disaster.
03:59So, the 25th space shuttle mission is now on the way after more delays than NASA cares to count.
04:06The January 28th, 1986 launch of the space shuttle Challenger carried New Hampshire educator Krista McAuliffe, the first teacher in
04:14space, which generated intense media interest.
04:17The air at Cape Canaveral was thick with excitement as the shuttle ignited its engines and began its ascent.
04:23Let's go down to the Kennedy Space Center and take a look at Challenger sitting on the pad.
04:2610, 9, 8, 7, 6, we have main engine start, 4, 3, 2, 1, and liftoff, liftoff of the 25th
04:40space shuttle mission, and it has cleared the tower.
04:43For 73 seconds, the launch proceeded as planned.
04:47Then, in a heart-wrenching instant, the shuttle exploded into a fiery cloud, disintegrating directly before the eyes of the
04:53world.
04:54The live CNN feed, which moments before had shown a soaring triumph, now depicted plumes of smoke and debris falling
05:01toward the ocean.
05:02Looks like a couple of the solid rocket boosters blew away from the side of the shuttle in an explosion.
05:17Flight controllers here looking very carefully at the situation.
05:22Obviously a major malfunction.
05:24Arba Dwyer's infamous press conference.
05:26In the last paragraph of his speech to reporters, Dwyer today said,
05:29Last May, I told you that after the trial, I would give you the story of the decade.
05:34I am going to die in office in an effort to see if the shameful facts spread out in all
05:40the shame will not burn through our civic shamelessness and set fire to American pride.
05:45Pennsylvania State Treasurer Arba Dwyer convened a press conference on January 22, 1987, ostensibly to address his conviction on bribery
05:53charges.
05:54Dwyer had maintained his innocence throughout the ordeal.
05:56As the cameras rolled, Dwyer began to deliver a lengthy, impassioned speech.
06:01Rather than a resignation, Dwyer produced a manila envelope and pulled out a .357 caliber Magnum revolver.
06:08A troubled man in Pennsylvania called a news conference.
06:11The news being that he pulled a gun and shot himself to death as videotape cameras and still cameras recorded
06:18the act.
06:18And there it was again.
06:20One of those monstrous moments of truth that reveals similarities we don't often dwell on.
06:25Similarities between the process we call television and the process of the human soul.
06:30Despite shouts from reporters to put the gun down, he warned bystanders against intervening, stating,
06:36this will hurt someone.
06:38Dwyer then put the barrel of the gun into his mouth and pulled the trigger.
06:41And Pennsylvania news stations were left to determine just how much of the grisly incident they could show on television.
06:47Please tell my story on every radio and TV station and in every newspaper and magazine in the United States.
06:54Please make sure that the sacrifice of my life is not in vain.
06:58That is the verbatim text of the last paragraph of Dwyer's remarks before he shot himself.
07:02David Horowitz taken hostage.
07:04The man who had been permitted to watch the broadcast in the studio had given no indication of his intent.
07:09He had been sitting quietly until David Horowitz was ready to begin broadcasting his consumer segment.
07:16KMBC Los Angeles news reporter David Horowitz once found himself becoming the story.
07:21During a live afternoon broadcast on August 19, 1987, a man named Gary Stolman held Horowitz at gunpoint,
07:28demanding to read a rambling, incoherent statement on air.
07:31Alright, well, let me read this. Folks, we have someone on the set who's standing here and would like me
07:36to read.
07:38Horowitz, showing remarkable composure, attempted to de-escalate the situation,
07:43agreeing to read the assailant's statement while the station's feed was cut and replaced with a police standby card.
07:49After about 30 harrowing minutes, Horowitz finished the statement and convinced Stewart to place the weapon on the desk,
07:55allowing police to move in.
07:57Max Headroom Signal Hijacking.
08:07This bizarre incident felt like something ripped straight from a dystopian sci-fi film unfolding late one Sunday evening in
08:13Chicago.
08:14On November 22, 1987, viewers of WGN-TV were engrossed in a segment of the 9 o'clock news about
08:21the Chicago Bears,
08:22when suddenly, the screen warped and distorted.
08:25What followed was a roughly 30-second intrusion,
08:28a pirate broadcast featuring a masked figure, later dubbed the Max Headroom Hacker,
08:33mocking the real Max Headroom character and mimicking his distinctive stutter.
08:37Just minutes later, the same hacker struck again,
08:41interrupting a Doctor Who broadcast on PBS affiliate WTTW.
08:45This second intrusion lasted about 90 seconds,
08:48this time subjecting the figure to a simulated spanking from an unseen hand.
08:52The hackers have never been identified.
08:55Oh, I just made a giant masterpiece for all of the greatest world newspaper nerds.
09:03Attack on Reginald Denny.
09:05The four suspects in the Reginald Denny beating and robbery arrived at the courthouse this morning in chains and cuffs,
09:11expecting to be arraigned on charges of attempted murder, aggravated mayhem, torture, and robbery.
09:16The city of Los Angeles erupted into chaos following the acquittal of four LAPD officers in the Rodney King beating
09:23trial.
09:24From that chaos, a harrowing scene unfolded that laid bare the raw fury gripping the community.
09:29I don't feel responsible for this verdict. I mean, for the rioting at all.
09:34The cause of this riot goes far beyond this verdict.
09:38These things have been going on for 25 years.
09:40And the tragedy of this is that the department has not changed one iota for the use of force.
09:47So the same type incident could happen tonight.
09:50On April 29th, 1992, news helicopters hovered above, broadcasting live images of the unfolding riots.
09:56A roving news helicopter, on which journalists Zoe Turr and Marika Girard were passengers, captured a moment of unimaginable brutality.
10:05Truck driver Reginald Denny was driving his 18-wheeler through the intersection of Florence and Normandy avenues when he was
10:11pulled from his vehicle by a mob of rioters.
10:14What followed was a vicious, sustained assault, witnessed by millions in real time.
10:18The judge denied a motion that one of the defendants, Damian Williams, be released on his own recognizance.
10:24So all of the suspects will remain in custody until the arraignment, which is now scheduled for next Thursday.
10:309-11 attacks. A second plane hits the World Trade Center.
10:34One plane hijacked American Airlines Flight 11 from Boston to Los Angeles.
10:39And that is apparently one of the planes used in this crash.
10:44The morning of September 11th, 2001, began with confusion as news reports filtered in about a plane striking the North
10:51Tower of the World Trade Center.
10:52As news networks quickly went live, broadcasting images of smoke billowing from the skyscraper, reporters struggled to comprehend the scale
11:00of the event.
11:00As millions watched the live feeds on CNN, ABC, CBS, and NBC, a second Boeing 767, United Airlines Flight 175,
11:11slashed into the frame.
11:12Well, we have a little more sound here for witnesses.
11:14I went to Firewall Company. The doorman goes to me.
11:16Wow, I've never seen a plane flying so low.
11:19And we looked out at it. All of a sudden, boom.
11:21It seemed like it wasn't even real.
11:25And we came running over here, closer to the place, and all of a sudden, we saw the other explosion.
11:29On the NBC broadcast, Matt Lauer was mid-sentence when the second plane banked sharply and slammed into the South
11:36Tower in a massive, blinding fireball.
11:39Cameras already focused on the North Tower captured the jetliner flying low and fast before slamming into the South Tower
11:45in a massive fireball.
11:47I will tell you that what fell, what I saw fall, had to be at least 40, 50 stories of
11:51that building at first.
11:53The skeleton was left at about, I would say, the 50 or 60th floor after the shell, after the structure
12:00of the building fell down.
12:01The skeleton, the steel skeleton, was literally sheaved off, and it took probably about another 30 seconds before the skeleton
12:10collapsed into the street.
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12:27Mr. Flanagan kills Allison Parker and Adam Ward.
12:30We are following breaking news this morning out of Franklin County, news that has affected our WDBJ-7 family very
12:36deeply.
12:37Our WDBJ-7 morning crew was live this morning at Smith Mountain Lake when shots were fired around 6.45.
12:44And our general manager and WDBJ-7 vice president, Jeff Marks, is here to tell us more about what happened.
12:52On August 26, 2015, reporter Allison Parker and cameraman Adam Ward of WDBJ-7 were gunned down during a live
13:01morning segment at Smith Mountain Lake in Virginia.
13:04Parker was conducting a routine interview when their broadcast was suddenly interrupted by a rapid succession of gunshots.
13:10Okay, not sure what happened there.
13:12The stunned local anchor, unsure about what just happened.
13:16And I heard this, pow, pow, pow, pow, pow.
13:18And it did not register that it was gunshots.
13:20She's doing a little feature story at the legs, so my mind did not immediately go to that worst-case
13:26scenario.
13:26The perpetrator, Vester Flanagan, specifically targeted his former colleagues.
13:31Flanagan was a former WDBJ reporter who had been fired for volatile behavior two years prior.
13:37After a high-speed pursuit on Interstate 66 that lasted several hours, Flanagan ran his vehicle off the road and
13:43died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
13:45Tonight, a spokesman for the shooter's family reading this statement.
13:49It is with heavy hearts and deep sadness, we express our deepest condolences to the families of Allison Parker and
13:56Adam Ward.
13:57We are also praying for the recovery of Vicki Gardner.
14:01Some news outlets prioritized the news value of showing the killer's footage, while others pleaded to let the video fade
14:07into obscurity,
14:08sparking a fierce debate over the ethics of modern broadcasting.
14:11Which live news broadcast shocked you the most?
14:13Be sure to let us know in the comments below.
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