Lengthy earlier than subtle radar and 3D photos outlined native TV climate broadcasts, Jim O’Brien delivered the forecast with cloud magnets and a smile.
And that is all viewers wanted.
By means of the sheer energy of persona, the 6ABC Motion Information weatherman related with tens of millions of viewers within the Delaware Valley.
And even 40 years after his dying in a skydiving accident on Sept. 25, 1983, O’Brien remains to be fondly remembered.
Wednesday’s information that two 6ABC journalists have been killed in a helicopter crash in South Jersey additionally had the group recalling O’Brien.
6ABC helicopter crash: Channel 6 Action News helicopter crash in Burlington County kills pilot, photographer
O’Brien, a Texas native who started his broadcasting profession as a radio DJ, and later labored in Philadelphia because the host of “Dialing for {Dollars},” joined Motion Information in 1976, the place he anchored broadcasts and co-hosted the station’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.
However he was finest recognized for these low-tech, high-energy climate segments.
Meteorologist Cecily Tynan, who joined Motion Information in 1995, praised O’Brien at the moment in a Fb publish marking the 35 anniversary of his dying in 2018: “35 years in the past, the 6abc Motion Information household and the whole Philadelphia space misplaced a legend. I want I had the chance to work with Jim O’Brien. He was one in 1,000,000.”
In a tribute that 6ABC aired in 2013, 30 years after O’Brien’s dying, now-retired anchor Jim Gardner talked about having to broadcast the tragic information.
“What we tried to do as finest we might was to inform what occurred, and to unavoidably convey our emotions,” Gardner mentioned. “And it was unavoidable, as a result of most of us have been crying.”
O’Brien’s daughter — actress Peri Gilpin, finest recognized for enjoying Roz on “Frazier” — additionally talked about her dad within the 2013 tribute.
“I do know that the whole lot he did, he did it with gusto. You understand? And I do know that Philadelphia was so near his coronary heart,” she mentioned.
Post by 6abcCecilyTynan.
This text initially appeared on Cherry Hill Courier-Publish: Jim O’Brien recalled as region mourns loss of 6ABC pilot, photographer
At this time Information High Newsmaac
