EAU CLAIRE — A University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire graduate is among the Federal Emergency Management Agency public affairs officers who have been documenting the ongoing search-and-rescue operation at the World Trade Center disaster site in New York City.
      Jim Chesnutt, a 1989 journalism graduate, and his FEMA colleagues have provided local and network news organizations with footage every day, documenting the rescuers’ ongoing search for survivors and victims. Because the disaster area is a crime scene, network camera crews have been prohibited from the area, thus they rely on video shot by the FEMA crew.
      Chesnutt, 35, of Boulder, Colo., arrived in New York City immediately after the two planes crashed into the World Trade Center. He arrived expecting to provide reporters with information but the former TV news photographer was instead asked to shoot video. During his nine years with FEMA, Chesnutt has responded to a variety of disasters, including hurricanes, tornadoes and floods.
      Stories about Chesnutt’s work at the World Trade Center site have appeared in the Sept. 27 issue of USA Today and on the Sunday Today Show on Sept. 23.

  News Bureau   

Judy Berthiaume
UW-Eau Claire News Bureau
Schofield 201
(715) 836-4741
newsbur@uwec.edu

Updated: Oct. 1, 2001