WPG Brings Listeners to FOX News Channel in New York City

Little did we know that as we were headed into New York City Monday morning, WPG's trip to FOX News Channel would become more interesting as news broke of a explosion just blocks from where we were headed.

In the pre-dawn hours of Monday morning, a group of WPG listeners jumped on to a bus for our trip to tour FOX News Channel in New York City. Our drive up was rather uneventful, especially since our journey began at 5AM. We entered the Lincoln Tunnel and everything was normal. But as we were leaving the tunnel, news broke about a possible terrorist attack in or near Times Square. The already slow-moving traffic in the area became even slower as the sounds of police cars and fire trucks filled the air. Many on the bus took to their phones to find out what was going on. We learned there was an explosion at 42nd & 8th -- just a handful of blocks away from where we were going at 48th and 6th. Undeterred, we eventually made it to FOX News Channel.

Once inside the 45-story building, we spent a good amount of time in the FOX & Friends green room where our original plans for the morning changed due to FOX's wall-to-wall news coverage. However, as it turned out, plan B for our group was just as exciting.

The 14 people in our group got to meet all of the FOX & Friends anchors -- Steve Doocy, Ainsley Earhardt, Brian Kilmeade, and Janice Dean. All four took time out of what was quickly becoming a big news day to meet our group.

The next stop on our tour was up to the 18th floor where we got to see Brian Kilmeade's national radio show in person -- from both the control room and from inside Brian's studio. Again, given the news of the day, watching Brian's team handle a breaking news story was incredible.

Following Brian's show, we got to see the inner-workings of FOX News Channel itself, including the set where Bill Hemmer was live on the air from covering the Port Authority explosion and we also got a peak at Shepard Smith's News Deck.

And a visit to FOX News Radio would not be complete without paying a visit to Todd Starnes!

It's important to note that while news was breaking just blocks away from the FOX News Channel building, you would have never known anything major was happening by talking to the employees and anchors inside FOX. You might think that a major news network covering a major news story would have people running down hallways, paper flying everywhere, people yelling as they were trying to get the latest information -- it was anything but that. Every person there was calm, cool, and professional -- and everyone that we bumped into welcomed us with open arms and stopped what they were doing to greet us.

WPG's Harry Hurley summed it up this way: "It was even a more interesting tour because we arrived 4 blocks away from the terrorist attack at exactly the time the underground explosion rang out. Brian, Ainsley, Steve and Todd Starnes couldn’t have been nicer or more accommodating. Especially considering the circumstances. Giving listeners the opportunity to see how the national news is gathered and reported from the inside-out versus the outside-in is extraordinary."

After nearly two hours inside FOX News, we departed and headed across the street to check out the Christmas Tree at Rockfeller Center, which was followed by a truly amazing tour of St. Patrick's Cathedral, which you can see in some of the pictures below.

Congratulations to all of our winners!