From WNYC in Lower Manhattan, this is NPR's On the Media. I'm Bob Garfield.

And I'm Brooke Gladstone. Obviously, we're back after skipping a week. One of the reasons being that WNYC, where we produce our show, is located six blocks from the World Trade Center, and we were evacuated. In fact,

this show has been produced partly in the good offices of public TV station WNET, which is not

set up for radio, so if the sound is not quite up to par, that's why. Still, we were on the air

last week, working on NPR's special coverage,

and one of OTM's contributions was this chronology of the first 48 hours of coverage by our producer at large Mike Peska.

There's a lot of new ground to cover this week,

but we'd like to begin with this recapitulation of how it started.

We didn't know it then, but early Tuesday morning, America was a normal place.

The American media were operating as normal.

The front page of the New York Times featured a primary that few New Yorkers had been paying attention to.

Fergie was discussing weight loss on Good Morning America. Mr. Peanut had shown up on the set of the Today Show.

And then the first plane hit. We just got a report in that there's been some sort of explosion.

The terrorists had already succeeded on one count, gaining media attention. And with the cameras trained, the second hit.

We just saw on live television as a second plane flew into the second tower of the World Trade Center.

Within half an hour, a New York landmark was toppled.

The entire building has just collapsed.

The whole side was collapsed? The whole building has just collapsed. The whole side was collapsed?

The whole building has collapsed.

The whole building has collapsed.

The nation's confidence was shattered.

Wait a second.

...