A “Happy” Christmas Night, WTIC 1080 Hartford | December 25, 1985

WTIC 1080

First time I heard this I nearly fell off my chair! Digressing for a moment, most of us on air people have heard or have access to a station blooper tape that got played at various occasions… Station Christmas parties being the usual place for such hilarity. Not this time. This one is NOT from a station in house recording, it was made by the contributor.

Steve Tefft has the knack of having his recorder on at *just* the right time. Here’s an aircheck that reminds us that sometimes automation isn’t ALWAYS bad… given the right circumstances.

Steve writes:

(Here is an) outtake of WTIC news reader Paul Reynolds, from Christmas night, 1985. It starts with the jingle intro to the news, followed by about 20 seconds of silence(apparently Reynolds was passed out in the newsroom). Then, talk host John Birchard scrambles to his mike, vamps for time, then hands it over to Paul…who does his thing.
About 30 seconds into the newscast the engineer realizes what’s happening and yanks Reynolds off the air.

…Christmas parties might have been scaled back a bit in 1986 🙂