VIDEOTAPE that might contain footage of the explosion that wounded ABC News anchor Bob Woodruff and cameraman Doug Vogt in Iraq is now in the hands of ABC News executives in New York.
But they haven’t yet viewed the tape, nor removed it from the damaged camera in which it is loaded, a spokesman for ABC News said yesterday.
Vogt, 46, was shooting videotape of Woodruff, 44, and the surrounding area as the two were standing with their upper bodies exposed in an Iraqi military vehicle when their convoy was attacked by a roadside IED (improvised explosive device).
Both men were seriously wounded and are now being treated at Bethesda Naval Hospital in Maryland.
The camera Vogt was using was brought along with them as they made their journey from Iraq – via Landstuhl, Germany – to Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland, where they landed Tuesday.
“It was hand-carried back from Iraq to Germany to Washington and now to New York,” the ABC News spokesman said. “The tape is still in the camera.”
He didn’t specify why the tape had not yet been removed, but he did say the camera was “banged up” in the attack.
Since ABC News execs have not yet seen what is on the tape, they do not know how much, if any, of the explosion and its aftermath were recorded.
Nor can they yet determine whether the videotape is suitable for airing on TV.
Such a decision “would be according to the same standards that we would apply to any war footage,” the spokesman said.
TV news organizations often shy away from airing war footage they judge to be too graphic for their viewers.