Traffic

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traffic/woodard/20/mark2nd

By CHRISTOPHER WOODARD

Staff Reporter

“We’ve got a police pursuit going on that started around San Clemente,” veteran KFWB-AM 980 chopper jock Jeff Baugh advises his pilot, Evan Jensen. “The guy’s wanted on an assault with a deadly weapon charge. He’s definitely coming our way.”

“Sweet,” says Jensen as he powers the Bell Jet Ranger off the tarmac at Van Nuys Airport and sends it thunk, thunk, thunking toward the Sepulveda Pass at 120 miles per hour. The adrenaline is flowing and it’s easy to see why for an L.A. traffic reporter, this is as good as it gets.

Baugh, 56, dons headset and mike and hunches over a five-inch Sony television mounted on the dashboard to monitor the chase on live TV.

“These guys crack me up. He’s got an arm out the window, and he’s just as casual as can be,” says Baugh, grinning at Jensen and turning back to the small screen.

As it makes its way over the pass, the helicopter is buffeted by thermals and takes a few hard jolts. Still, Baugh remains at ease, helping Jensen keep track of other aircraft while monitoring his police scanner and talking to colleagues at the station.

At the San Diego and Marina freeways, Baugh and Jensen circle and wait as the driver makes his way north on the 405. Why put LAX air-traffic controllers through the hassle of shepherding the helicopter past busy runways if the runner is coming this way, Baugh figures.

Soon the suspect, a 47-year-old man who allegedly pulled a knife on workers at a tow-truck company, is headed in the helicopter’s direction.

The brown van, a bicycle perched on top, cruises north at 55 mph, trailed by a dozen California Highway Patrol cruisers and an airborne armada of eight media and two CHP helicopters.

Baugh launches into his first live report of the afternoon. “Lock your doors, be aware of your surroundings and don’t get involved,” he tells listeners unfortunate enough to be stuck in the path of the pursuit. “Stay calm and stay where you are.”

The ensuing chase over the Sepulveda Pass takes on a kind of “Apocalypse Now” quality, with the dragonfly-like aircraft flying in unison over the hillside, the late-afternoon sun glinting off the rotors.

Baugh takes in the media circus and shakes his head.

“With my audience, people in their cars listening to the radio, I feel like we’re doing a good service,” he says. “We’re letting them know what’s going on out there, and in cases like this, reminding them to lock their doors. But TV has made such a big thing out of these pursuits. I don’t see how they’re helping the community. It’s strictly entertainment.”

Baugh fires off live news dispatches every 20 minutes, with brief traffic reports laced in between. He learns from his scanner that the suspect has parents in Calabasas, and suspects the man is headed in that direction.

Sure enough, the runner heads west on the Ventura (101) Freeway, leading police across the floor of the San Fernando Valley, into an affluent Calabasas neighborhood and right up to his parents’ front door.

With so many helicopters in such a tight air space, the potential for a collision is real. Jensen finds himself in a high-stakes aerial ballet with eight other helicopters, all hovering at different heights, each jockeying for the best possible view of the action.

The helicopter begins making tight circles around the home, as police fire beanbag guns to take down the suspect.

After reporting to his listeners that it’s all over, Baugh looks over to Jensen and says, “Okay, let’s go have some fun.”

With that, the pilot noses the chopper toward the Santa Monica Mountains, over big-windowed mansions, green hillsides and grazing cattle. The helicopter glides over the Pacific Coast Highway and skims over the ocean.

Baugh has had a varied life. He grew up in Brooklyn and did two tours of duty in Vietnam as a Marine. After the war, he worked as a disk jockey in New York’s club scene, and then in L.A., before breaking in as a traffic reporter at KPWR “Power 106” in the ’80s.

For the past nine years, he has worked for Shadow Broadcasting Services, a company that provides traffic reports to more than 40 Southern California radio stations, including Baugh’s station KFWB.

As the helicopter glides toward Marina del Rey, Baugh ruminates about his occupation. He’s had several close calls, including a recent run-in with an errant pigeon, which blasted through the front windshield of his helicopter as it was traveling at more than 120 miles an hour. The bird nearly hit the pilot.

Still, he says he wouldn’t trade jobs with anyone.

Baugh and Jensen glide over the skyscrapers of Wilshire Boulevard for the last few traffic reports of the afternoon, the air crisp and clean from yesterday’s storm. The setting sun gives the L.A. sky a rosy, even hopeful hue.

“Every once in a while I just kind of have to remind myself hey, I get paid for this,” says Baugh.

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