LIVE24SEVEN // Interviews
Taking what some may perceive as a glamourous job aside, this can be far from the truth. Kay has on many occasions woken wondering which hemisphere she is now in and has been at the front of the action of some of the most appalling global tragedies. She says, “Hurricane Katrina was simply devastating. Our 16-man crew (well 15-man as she was the only woman), all had to cram in a Winnebago whilst reporting from New Orleans with one of them sleeping on the dashboard!” That was a frightening time due to the breakdown of law in the aftermath of the storm but it was the terror of the Paris attacks last November, which has really left its footprint on Kay.
“The night it happened, I was here at my home in The Cotswolds having supper with some girlfriends. I had been alerted by the office what was unfolding and was watching it on the telly until 2am. The following morning after only a couple of hours sleep, I was sitting on the Eurostar on my way to report. As my son said, ‘Mum’s heading to Paris while anyone sensible is heading the opposite way.’
“As I was broadcasting from Paris, there were still so many bodies lying there and being covered up. It was just ghastly.” A day later, Kay and her crew had what they thought could have been their near-death experience. Sitting in a café opposite the Place de la Republique, preparing for a broadcast, there was the sound of gunfire (which in fact was someone letting off a firecracker). Everyone in the square started screaming and just ran while Kay and her crew having no-where to run to had to hit the deck inside amongst a mass of broken crockery and glass. They thought they were under siege though luckily it was just a false alarm.
“I felt probably the most scared I have been but I was in control. I didn’t want to think if this was it, that my son may see his mother being killed like this,” she says. “One’s natural reporter instinct kicks in as we undergo lots of hostile environment training for this kind of incident. We were lying on the decks in the café for what was probably 2-3 minutes though felt like a lifetime. I was calm though throughout the whole episode.”
It was the death of Princess Diana that Kay personally feels has been the saddest time she has reported on. “I knew Diana a little bit. We used the same gym, we were the same age and we both had young sons. I remember receiving the call saying, ‘can you come in? Dodi’s dead, Diana’s fine but hurt her leg.’ I recall driving to the studios at 5.50am but then barriers were being placed around around the hospital - we knew she had died.” She continued, “The then Foreign Secretary, Robin Cook’s plane was kept on the ground as none of Her Majesty’s government can be in the air when an announcement of a Royal death is made. I went on air and it fell to me to say that she was dead. It was so heartbreaking, she was my age and had been running around Europe looking for love and it came to me to break this story – it was a tragic end to the most famous woman in the world.”
Kay took her son who was then 4 years old and went to Kensington Palace to sign the Book of Condolence. She says, “Waiting in the queue my son asked, ‘why are we here?’ I replied, ‘to tell the Princess that we will look after her little boys now she has died,’ ‘Well why can’t the Prince kiss her and she will wake up,’ was his reply. Two Americans in front
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