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Moscow made a rare appearance as the Story of the Day. Both NBC and CBS led with the morning rush hour bombs at the Lubyanka and Park Kultury stations in its subway system. A pair of suicidal women set off separate explosions that killed almost 40 fellow passengers. NBC's correspondent was on the scene; CBS voiced over the videotape from London. To mark the start of Holy Week, ABC led with a Christian story. No, not the Roman Catholic Church's defense of its handling of pedophile priests. ABC selected the Michigan-based Hutaree, a self-styled Christian militia, accused by the FBI of hatching a plot to assassinate police officers.

Both NBC's Jim Maceda and ABC's Alex Marquardt were in Moscow to cover the subway bombs. "After six years of relative quiet, terror had returned to the capital," Maceda announced. "Today's attack echoed a wave of female suicide bombings almost a decade ago by so-called Black Widows, named after the wife of a slain Chechen commander seeking her revenge." Maceda pointed out that the Russian suppression of a Chechen secessionist uprising 15 years ago left 100,000 dead. From London, CBS' Mark Phillips reminded us of some of the brutality of that conflict: a hostage siege at a Moscow theater and the dead children at their school in Beslan.

ABC's Marquardt marveled at how unphased Muscovites were: "Amazingly, by late afternoon, Moscow's entire subway system was back up and running. People headed home past remnants of the day's carnage and small memorials to the dead. Tonight, no signs of the chaos and carnage seen earlier."

Andrew Tyndall 3/30/10 10:21:18 pm

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