A CNN legend recalls fleeing a different Russian invasion

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A CNN legend recalls fleeing a different Russian invasion

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🎥 in more than 30 years at CNN, she's seen it all

Ingrid Formanek, CNN executive producer for video correspondents at large

Ingrid Formanek, an executive producer at CNN.

With three decades at CNN, Ingrid Formanek is a legend. She joined CNN in the mid-'80s as a video editor. She has since covered historic events including the First Gulf War, the fall of the Berlin Wall, the election of Nelson Mandela and the Iraq War, just to name a few.

She's now an executive producer at the network, overseeing larger-scale breaking news operations in the field. She also pitches and produces stories focused on climate change, which she stresses needs urgent attention as one of the world's most pressing crises.

She was recently stationed in Ukraine, enabling CNN's coverage of the war. She has been there on and off since January, setting up and coordinating CNN's remote bureau.

She spoke to Inside CNN from a hotel in Kyiv between news and security meetings. Here is a portion of our conversation:

Can you describe your role with CNN in Ukraine?

I was sent here early on, when there had been indications for a long time that there was a conflict brewing and CNN wanted to be prepared. The idea was to get Ukraine set up, so if and when war did start, we'd be in a good place technically and editorially, which meant bringing in engineers to make sure that we had communications and the ability to broadcast, editorially savvy people who knew the country and region to alert the network and our viewers and readers to the changing landscape.

Formanek (left) and CNN Senior Field Producer Gul Tuysuz, who worked with her to set up CNN's operations in Ukraine.

Intelligence sources suggested there would be power and communications cuts once Russia launched the invasion, so we needed to be prepared for that. That meant having alternate means to communicate and to power our operations. Our engineers set up backups for backups in the event of internet failure. We needed generators and fuel for them, in large enough quantities to keep us going for a while. You also need to stock up on water and food supplies. You need vehicles and drivers willing to stay and work through a conflict, potentially driving to front lines. You also need protective equipment for everybody, flak jackets, helmets, med kits.

Formanek when the war began on February 24. She's wearing a flak jacket and helmet inside a hotel in Kyiv. Photo credit: CNN Managing Photojournalist Christian Streib.

Risk is inherent in our jobs, but we make calculated decisions. You've got to do whatever you can to make sure we'll be as safe as possible. Looking at worst- and best-case scenarios, you have to be ready for all of them. For a large operation, like we had at the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, you need good people willing to work long hours and think out of the box to pull all that together. I could never have done that without my great colleagues on the ground, who really deserve the credit. And we made sure we had good local journalists around, which is always the key to everything.

Why is partnering with local journalists so important?

Every single place around the world where I've worked, the most important component is having good people from that country to work with us, whether they're editorial or logistical. In the case of Ukraine, it's the same thing. We managed to find a really amazing group of Ukrainian journalists. They are our eyes and ears on the ground and they help shape our coverage. And they're not all journalists; there are people from many different backgrounds who have helped us build up our operation. They're very often the unsung heroes of the work we do, because without them we couldn't do anything. I can't thank them enough for their contributions.

It's also important to note that for our Ukrainian journalists, fixers and drivers, the war is intensely personal. It's their country that is under attack. They have family and friends who've suffered tremendous personal losses. The worry, stress and uncertainty weigh on everybody, but their contribution, focus and dedication to their work with us can't be overstated. Those of us who come in to report from the outside go home at the end of our assignments. They don't have that luxury. They live the war day after day.

What's a moment from the conflict that will stay with you?

There's a deaf couple that we met at this hotel in Kyiv. They were employed here as cleaners and they would take care of our workspace and our live shot locations and clean day in and day out. When the war started, to them it was a very different experience than to most of us, because they couldn't hear the bombs unless there was shelling or bombing right next to you and the building shakes. They had no idea. They can't hear the bombs or sirens. They can't hear the warnings to go into a shelter. It really crystalized how much more difficult and challenging it is to navigate a conflict for people with disabilities.

The couple asked us for help because they wanted to leave the country. Now, that's not our job. We try to help people as much as we can, and it very much comes down to us as individuals to do the right thing. A lot of my colleagues here, we worked to help get them out of Ukraine because they felt unsafe. They ended up in Germany. They made a big impression on a lot of us, because they helped us a lot while we've been working here. This is not about us. It's about them.

I joke around about it, but it's not a joke – this is my second Russian invasion. I'm originally from Czechoslovakia, a country that was also invaded by Russia, the Soviet Union in those days. So this conflict to me has a strange resonance. I get what these people are going through, even though my country wasn't pummeled as much as this one. There was not nearly this amount of destruction and death and suffering.

I immigrated to the United States, to Minnesota, and eventually got American citizenship. It was the same sort of story. We were refugees fleeing with one suitcase each. I was lucky. We were lucky in the end.

You covered the Gulf War, and were portrayed by Helena Bonham Carter in a film called "Live From Baghdad." What was that like?

This 2002 photo shows Helena Bonham Carter (left) and Ingrid Formanek (right) at the premiere of "Live From Baghdad" in New York.

I'm not a huge fan of the movie, simply because I think there was too much Hollywood license taken, and the truth is usually more interesting than fiction. But what I do like about the movie is that it recognized the pivotal moment the first Gulf War was in terms of broadcast journalism.

CNN, the sole 24-hour global news channel at the time, was the go-to news source in the months leading up to the war. TVs in every government office around the globe were tuned to CNN because we provided real or near-real time coverage of the events. The term "The CNN Effect" was used, meaning that our coverage was so dominant and closely followed that it had an impact and influenced thinking and decision making of world leaders from the US to Iraq. But most importantly, we were the only network able to stay on the air out of Baghdad, broadcasting the opening night of the war around the world. Every other major US network, and countless media outlets around the world, pumped out CNN's coverage to keep people informed. Our reporting during that war really cemented CNN's place as a media giant.

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