KWQC veteran goes back to news

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| Sunday, May 22, 2005 |

On the morning of his 45th birthday, Michael Ortiz, East Moline, chief photographer at KWQC-TV6, Davenport, awoke to get a kiss from his wife and her wish that he "have a great day."

While dressing, he flipped on the TV and about 20 seconds later saw the first plane hit a tower in New York. He hardly had time to absorb what he'd seen when a second airliner, presumably packed with human cargo, hit a twin building. The date was 9/11/01.

In another few minutes his telephone began ringing and, of course, it was Andrea Davidson, KWQC news assignment editor, and he assured her he was on his way to work.

And so the day he had was a whirl of dealing with the shocked and bewildered reactions of officials and citizenry alike at the Quad-City airport and elsewhere as the life-changing portent of what had happened sank in. He says that even today the images of what he had seen on the TV screen "tears me up and it's difficult to even talk about it."

The terrorist attack on the country tops all the many dramatic events Ortiz and Davidson worked on together during the last decade. So it seems only natural that he should be chosen to succeed her as the station's news assignment editor now that she's decided to move back to her home state of Colorado after a dozen rewarding years in the post, says Jim Graham, general manager of KWQC.

Ortiz, a lifelong resident of the Silvis-East Moline area, is a graduate of United Township High School and Black Hawk Community College, Moline, and has a degree in mass communications granted by St. Ambrose University in 1986.

After working at WQAD-TV, Moline, for about six months, he joined KWQC and after serving as a photographer for eight years, became chief photographer in 1995. A few months ago he decided on a change of pace that took him into the sales department.

But on May 27 (after the May ratings book comes out) Davidson's adieu to news is due and Ortiz will return to take up the business of plotting assignments.

He figures that by July he will have had 18 years at KWQC and the only colleagues that were there when he came are Paula Sands, Terry Swails, Thom Cornelis and Dan Pearson, who joined when he did.

Graham and April Samp, KWQC's new news director, said they are rejoicing that the veteran Ortiz is available for the assignment editor chore.

Samp says she believes he'll bring "fire and energy" to the position where "Andrea has done such a fabulous job, being largely responsible for the station's No. 1 news rating in this market."

Davidson says she opted to go back to Colorado because her husband has a great career opportunity there and she and their children will be close to her parents and a couple of brothers.

A graduate of Drake University in Iowa, she became affiliated with KWQC in April 1993, and was a production assistant before winning designation as assignment editor.

She's not the only KWQC news staffer heeding the call of their roots. A few weeks ago Lora Ullerich, originally from Hastings, Neb., who joined KWQC in February, 2003, after working at TV stations in Hastings and Lincoln, pulled up stakes and headed for the Omaha area, Samp said.

The news director says interviews have begun to determine her successor.

Contact the features desk at

(563) 383-2400 or newsroom@qctimes.com.