9/11/2001; Morning drive in Los Angeles at KFI Radio with Bill Handel

If you listened to KFI in the morning on 9/11, this is for you just the way you originally heard it

Tuesday morning started with my alarm going off at 5AM Pacific Daylight Time, and the voices of the KFI Morning Team of Bill Handel, Paul (The Wall), Ken Nolan, Rich Marotta, Michelle Kube, and Ken Gallagher blasted me awake.

Getting my car started and headed from Camarillo to Moorpark, California at 5:30AM entailed a full cup of coffee, a fresh smoke fired up, and KFI. Rush gave his Morning Update. Rush was just losing his hearing then, and his voice is noticeably different in the Morning Update, you’ll notice. What follows is the show in its entirety, hour-by-hour, as it happened. Commercials went away after the 5 o’clock hour, and shock and confusion reigned at KFI, as everywhere else;

5AM Hour
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6AM Hour
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7AM Hour
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8AM Hour
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At this point, Rush wasn’t making it, his plane had been diverted;

On 11 September 2001, Bill Handel was on air live when the attacks took place. Rush Limbaugh (whose show follows The Bill Handel Show on KFI) was forced to divert his flight, and was unable to start at his regular time. Because KFI is the West Coast flagship of the EIB Network, Bill Handel continued to broadcast for another 3 hours, and was carried in place of Rush Limbaugh on most stations in the country (as well as the taped broadcast for Armed Forces Radio overseas).

9AM Hour
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10AM Hour
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11AM Hour
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12PM Hour
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All files were downloaded to iTunes and I’ve listened every year on 9/11 via my iPod. You can too, right-click on each and select “Save-As”;
5AM 6AM 7AM 8AM 9AM 10AM 11AM 12PM

(Photo circa 1995, via
KFI Tribute Page)