Miles O'Brien (journalist)
Encyclopedia
Miles O'Brien is a broadcast news
journalist specializing in aviation, space and technology.
pilot. His father, a private pilot, taught him how to fly at an early age. His first flights were in small Cessna
s and Pipers rented by his father. O'Brien's paternal and maternal grandfathers were also both pilots.
, he served as CNN
's chief technology and environment correspondent. He was also the network’s space and aviation correspondent and an occasional stand-in anchor. He anchored The Situation Room
on November 26, 2008, covering the terrorist attack in Mumbai on the Oberoi Trident
and Taj Mahal
Hotels, as well as several other locations.
He covered Hurricane Katrina
for several weeks anchoring CNN’s Peabody
and Dupont Award-winning coverage.
During his 16-year tenure at CNN, he anchored several news and talk programs, including Science and Technology Week, Saturday Morning, Sunday Morning, TalkBack Live, Headline News Primetime, Live From... and, most recently, American Morning
.
It was announced on December 3, 2008 that O'Brien would be leaving CNN, along with 6 producers, as a result of the company disbanding most of its science and technology unit.
In April 2009 he joined True/Slant as a blogger; in May, he began as a recurrent video contributor for the Spaceflight Now podcast This Week in Space.
In 2009 Miles joined PBS
working on Blueprint America that deals with rebuilding America infrastructure where the redirection of focus from the auto to high-speed rail and other mass transit options.
On October 15, 2009, Miles made an appearance on Fox Business News covering the breaking news story of the Colorado runaway mylar helium balloon with a supposedly trapped child inside the balloon.
On October 27, 2009, Miles publicly announced that he has been made a member of the NASA Advisory Council (NAC) as the Chairman of the Education and Outreach Committee.
In February 2010, he worked on the Frontline documentary, "Flying Cheap" which aired on the 1 year anniversary of the Colgan Air plane crash in Buffalo, NY. The highly acclaimed documentary featured former Colgan Air pilots revealing shocking details about some attempts to keep underpaid pilots flying beyond legal limits.
In late September 2010, Miles joined PBS Newshour as a science correspondent.
O'Brien is on the board of the Next Generation Choices Foundation and the Less Cancer Campaign.
. In February 2003, he led the network’s coverage of the loss of the Space Shuttle Columbia
. Days before the disaster (and after years of negotiations), CNN and NASA had reached an agreement that would have made O’Brien the first journalist to fly to low earth orbit on the space shuttle to visit the International Space Station
.
O’Brien also covered the repair missions to the Hubble Space Telescope
; the shuttle dockings at Mir; the launch of the first space station crew from Kazakhstan
; several robotic landings on Mars and the private sector endeavors of Burt Rutan
and others.
In October 1998, he co-anchored CNN’s coverage of John Glenn
’s return to space with broadcast journalist Walter Cronkite
. He was assigned this chair after the sudden death of John Holliman
.
In 2000, he produced, shot and wrote a one-hour documentary on the process of readying a space shuttle for flight. Terminal Count: What it Takes to Make the Space Shuttle Fly aired in May 2001.
In the wake of the September 11 attacks, O'Brien provided viewers radar tracks of the hijacked flights while the twin towers were still standing. During the Afghanistan
and Iraq
invasions, he, along with various retired generals, reported on military aviation techniques and strategy.
O'Brien reported the airliner crashes of US Airways Flight 427, ValuJet 592, TWA 800, EgyptAir 990, American Airlines 587, Comair 5191, and others.
He has also reported on the crashes of John F. Kennedy, Jr.
, Payne Stewart
, and Paul Wellstone
, the C-150 incursion into the Washington DC Air Defense Identification Zone and the Cory Lidle
crash in Manhattan.
Broadcast News
Broadcast News may refer to:*News*Broadcast News , the 1987 movie*Broadcast journalism, the field of news and journals which are published by electrical methods...
journalist specializing in aviation, space and technology.
Early life
O’Brien is a third-generation general aviationGeneral aviation
General aviation is one of the two categories of civil aviation. It refers to all flights other than military and scheduled airline and regular cargo flights, both private and commercial. General aviation flights range from gliders and powered parachutes to large, non-scheduled cargo jet flights...
pilot. His father, a private pilot, taught him how to fly at an early age. His first flights were in small Cessna
Cessna
The Cessna Aircraft Company is an airplane manufacturing corporation headquartered in Wichita, Kansas, USA. Their main products are general aviation aircraft. Although they are the most well known for their small, piston-powered aircraft, they also produce business jets. The company is a subsidiary...
s and Pipers rented by his father. O'Brien's paternal and maternal grandfathers were also both pilots.
Career
Based in New York CityNew York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
, he served as CNN
CNN
Cable News Network is a U.S. cable news channel founded in 1980 by Ted Turner. Upon its launch, CNN was the first channel to provide 24-hour television news coverage, and the first all-news television channel in the United States...
's chief technology and environment correspondent. He was also the network’s space and aviation correspondent and an occasional stand-in anchor. He anchored The Situation Room
The Situation Room
The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer is an afternoon/early evening newscast on CNN and CNN International hosted by Wolf Blitzer that first aired on August 8, 2005. The show replaces three politics and hard news programs: Judy Woodruff's Inside Politics, Crossfire and Wolf Blitzer Reports.At first,...
on November 26, 2008, covering the terrorist attack in Mumbai on the Oberoi Trident
Oberoi Trident
The Oberoi and Trident are two brands of five star hotels operated and sometimes owned by the Oberoi Hotels & Resorts located in several cities in India and across the world...
and Taj Mahal
Taj Mahal Palace & Tower
The Taj Mahal Palace & Tower is a five-star hotel located in the Colaba region of Mumbai, Maharashtra, India, next to the Gateway of India. Part of the Taj Hotels, Resorts and Palaces, this building is considered the flagship property of the group and contains 565 rooms...
Hotels, as well as several other locations.
He covered Hurricane Katrina
Hurricane Katrina
Hurricane Katrina of the 2005 Atlantic hurricane season was a powerful Atlantic hurricane. It is the costliest natural disaster, as well as one of the five deadliest hurricanes, in the history of the United States. Among recorded Atlantic hurricanes, it was the sixth strongest overall...
for several weeks anchoring CNN’s Peabody
Peabody Award
The George Foster Peabody Awards recognize distinguished and meritorious public service by radio and television stations, networks, producing organizations and individuals. In 1939, the National Association of Broadcasters formed a committee to recognize outstanding achievement in radio broadcasting...
and Dupont Award-winning coverage.
During his 16-year tenure at CNN, he anchored several news and talk programs, including Science and Technology Week, Saturday Morning, Sunday Morning, TalkBack Live, Headline News Primetime, Live From... and, most recently, American Morning
American Morning
American Morning is the morning television show on CNN. It premiered in 2001.-About the show:American Morning is hosted by Ashleigh Banfield, Zoraida Sambolin & Soledad O'Brien. Others who appear regularly are Rob Marciano with the weather, Sunny Hostin on legal news, and CNN senior medical...
.
It was announced on December 3, 2008 that O'Brien would be leaving CNN, along with 6 producers, as a result of the company disbanding most of its science and technology unit.
In April 2009 he joined True/Slant as a blogger; in May, he began as a recurrent video contributor for the Spaceflight Now podcast This Week in Space.
In 2009 Miles joined PBS
Public Broadcasting Service
The Public Broadcasting Service is an American non-profit public broadcasting television network with 354 member TV stations in the United States which hold collective ownership. Its headquarters is in Arlington, Virginia....
working on Blueprint America that deals with rebuilding America infrastructure where the redirection of focus from the auto to high-speed rail and other mass transit options.
On October 15, 2009, Miles made an appearance on Fox Business News covering the breaking news story of the Colorado runaway mylar helium balloon with a supposedly trapped child inside the balloon.
On October 27, 2009, Miles publicly announced that he has been made a member of the NASA Advisory Council (NAC) as the Chairman of the Education and Outreach Committee.
In February 2010, he worked on the Frontline documentary, "Flying Cheap" which aired on the 1 year anniversary of the Colgan Air plane crash in Buffalo, NY. The highly acclaimed documentary featured former Colgan Air pilots revealing shocking details about some attempts to keep underpaid pilots flying beyond legal limits.
In late September 2010, Miles joined PBS Newshour as a science correspondent.
O'Brien is on the board of the Next Generation Choices Foundation and the Less Cancer Campaign.
CNN space coverage
O’Brien may be best known for his coverage of the U.S. space programNASA
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is the agency of the United States government that is responsible for the nation's civilian space program and for aeronautics and aerospace research...
. In February 2003, he led the network’s coverage of the loss of the Space Shuttle Columbia
Space Shuttle Columbia
Space Shuttle Columbia was the first spaceworthy Space Shuttle in NASA's orbital fleet. First launched on the STS-1 mission, the first of the Space Shuttle program, it completed 27 missions before being destroyed during re-entry on February 1, 2003 near the end of its 28th, STS-107. All seven crew...
. Days before the disaster (and after years of negotiations), CNN and NASA had reached an agreement that would have made O’Brien the first journalist to fly to low earth orbit on the space shuttle to visit the International Space Station
International Space Station
The International Space Station is a habitable, artificial satellite in low Earth orbit. The ISS follows the Salyut, Almaz, Cosmos, Skylab, and Mir space stations, as the 11th space station launched, not including the Genesis I and II prototypes...
.
O’Brien also covered the repair missions to the Hubble Space Telescope
Hubble Space Telescope
The Hubble Space Telescope is a space telescope that was carried into orbit by a Space Shuttle in 1990 and remains in operation. A 2.4 meter aperture telescope in low Earth orbit, Hubble's four main instruments observe in the near ultraviolet, visible, and near infrared...
; the shuttle dockings at Mir; the launch of the first space station crew from Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan , officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a transcontinental country in Central Asia and Eastern Europe. Ranked as the ninth largest country in the world, it is also the world's largest landlocked country; its territory of is greater than Western Europe...
; several robotic landings on Mars and the private sector endeavors of Burt Rutan
Burt Rutan
Elbert Leander "Burt" Rutan is an American aerospace engineer noted for his originality in designing light, strong, unusual-looking, energy-efficient aircraft...
and others.
In October 1998, he co-anchored CNN’s coverage of John Glenn
John Glenn
John Herschel Glenn, Jr. is a former United States Marine Corps pilot, astronaut, and United States senator who was the first American to orbit the Earth and the third American in space. Glenn was a Marine Corps fighter pilot before joining NASA's Mercury program as a member of NASA's original...
’s return to space with broadcast journalist Walter Cronkite
Walter Cronkite
Walter Leland Cronkite, Jr. was an American broadcast journalist, best known as anchorman for the CBS Evening News for 19 years . During the heyday of CBS News in the 1960s and 1970s, he was often cited as "the most trusted man in America" after being so named in an opinion poll...
. He was assigned this chair after the sudden death of John Holliman
John Holliman
John Holliman was an American broadcast journalist. He was a member of the original reporting corps for CNN, serving as its agriculture correspondent after serving in the same capacity for Associated Press Radio in Washington, DC...
.
In 2000, he produced, shot and wrote a one-hour documentary on the process of readying a space shuttle for flight. Terminal Count: What it Takes to Make the Space Shuttle Fly aired in May 2001.
In the wake of the September 11 attacks, O'Brien provided viewers radar tracks of the hijacked flights while the twin towers were still standing. During the Afghanistan
Afghanistan
Afghanistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located in the centre of Asia, forming South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East. With a population of about 29 million, it has an area of , making it the 42nd most populous and 41st largest nation in the world...
and Iraq
Iraq
Iraq ; officially the Republic of Iraq is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert....
invasions, he, along with various retired generals, reported on military aviation techniques and strategy.
O'Brien reported the airliner crashes of US Airways Flight 427, ValuJet 592, TWA 800, EgyptAir 990, American Airlines 587, Comair 5191, and others.
He has also reported on the crashes of John F. Kennedy, Jr.
John F. Kennedy, Jr.
John Fitzgerald Kennedy, Jr. , often referred to as John F. Kennedy, Jr., JFK Jr., John Jr. or John-John, was an American socialite, magazine publisher, lawyer, and pilot. The elder son of U.S. President John F...
, Payne Stewart
Payne Stewart
William Payne Stewart was an American professional golfer who won three majors in his career, the last of which occurred only months before he died in an airplane accident at the age of 42....
, and Paul Wellstone
Paul Wellstone
Paul David Wellstone was a two-term U.S. Senator from the state of Minnesota and member of the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party, which is affiliated with the national Democratic Party. Before being elected to the Senate in 1990, he was a professor of political science at Carleton College...
, the C-150 incursion into the Washington DC Air Defense Identification Zone and the Cory Lidle
Cory Lidle
Cory Fulton Lidle was an Americanright-handed baseball pitcher who spent nine seasons in the major leagues with seven different teams. His twin brother Kevin Lidle also played baseball, as a catcher for several minor league teams...
crash in Manhattan.
Awards
- 1986 – Florida Emmy Award “Outstanding Coverage of a Single Breaking News Story” (Reporter) St. Petersburg Chlorine Leak
- 1989 – Boston/New England Emmy Award “Outstanding News Series” (Producer/Reporter) Boundaries of Fear
- 1990 – CINE “Golden Eagle” (Producer/Reporter) Boundaries of Fear
- 1993 – Computer Press Awards “Best Television Program” (Anchor/Correspondent/Writer) CNN Science and Technology Week
- 1993 – National Association of Science Writers “Science in Society Award” (Anchor/Correspondent/Writer) Sweet Fruit – Bitter Harvest.
- 1996 – News and Documentary Emmy Award “Outstanding Coverage of a Single breaking News Story” (Anchor) Coverage of the Olympic Park Bombing
- 2002 – Rotary National Award for Space Achievement “Space Communicator Award”
- 2002 – National Space Club “Media Award”
- 2006 – Society of Environmental Journalists “Award for Reporting on the Environment (Anchor/Correspondent/Writer) CNN Presents: Melting Point
- 2006 – National Press Club “Robert L Kozik Award for Environmental Reporting – First Place” (Anchor/Correspondent/Writer) CNN Presents: Melting Point
- 2006 – Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association “Max Karant Award for Excellence in General Aviation Journalism” (Correspondent) Small Planes
- 2006 – George Foster Peabody, Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University and News and Documentary Emmy Awards (Anchor/Correspondent) CNN Coverage of Hurricane Katrina and Aftermath CNN