The colleagues of slain journalists Alison Parker and Adam Ward described both reporters as “unfailingly positive, relentlessly hardworking” and the type of people who “never shied away from a story or challenge.” These remembrances are collected in a CNN segment, which you can watch above.
Both Parker and Ward started as interns at WDBJ, before working their way up to become a team during the early morning shift. While Parker was dating a WDBJ anchor, Ward was engaged to a morning show producer at the station. They were supposed to celebrate her last day at the station today.
This CNN article has more recollections from family, as well as former classmates and colleagues. Parker’s father released the following statement: “Alison was our bright, shining light, and it was cruelly extinguished by yet another crazy person with a gun. She excelled at everything she did and was loved by everyone she touched. She loved us dearly, and we talked to her every single day. Not hearing her voice again crushes my soul.”
Of Ward, a former colleague, Larell Reynolds, said, “He’s such a funny goofball. He had such a positive outlook on life, and he was so determined to put a smile on your face.”
“They’re terrific people,” WDBJ General Manager Jeff Marks told Wolf Blitzer in another CNN segment above:
They were exuberant, energetic. They were pros. You expect to hear me say that. In this case, it has the added value of being true. They were just wonderfully forward people who would do anything that was asked of them, and more. And I can’t imagine if you hand picked out of a million people two folk to have in your newsroom, that you wouldn’t have picked Alison Parker and Adam Ward.
Marks said that he wasn’t focused on the alleged shooter, Vester Flanagan, at this juncture, but the aforementioned CNN article quotes him as wondering why they had targeted both Parker and Ward:
“Why were they the targets and not I?” Marks said. “What do you do? Do you imagine that everyone who leaves your company under difficult circumstances is going to take aim?”
(Via CNN)