Yesterday, Julia blogged about Fox News correspondent Steve Harrigan’s brush with an angry, armed fat guy while covering the war in Georgia. Turns out that Harrigan’s cameraman, Mal James, blogged about it too. James, “who has a Pakistan Airlines Frequent Flyer Card….and boasts about it,” delivers a gripping first-person account of what it was like to run from “a crazed Ossestian wielding a pistol firing at journalists” while still shooting footage:
With fifty yards between us and the gunman I yelled for Steve to start talking, the drama and tension as I ran on with the camera pointing back at Steve, at this moment in time framing and lighting even exposure takes second place. It is a matter of capturing the impact…
I remember my arm finally touching the handle and opening the door to scramble in and I turned the camera still rolling to my face, my eyes shot with blood, my breathing and heart rate pulsing to the maximum. Lifting the camera I turned to Steve and said go…
He’s got pictures, too, and stories from other war zones where he’s worked. Somebody get this guy a book deal.
Justin Peters is editor-at-large of the Columbia Journalism Review.