Reporters have to cover night meetings, some of which take all evening. Reporters and photographers often go to accident scenes, crime scenes and wherever breaking news takes place. Finally, editors and page designers put the information together before it all goes to press and to our website, fredericknewspost.com.

Sometimes we can plan for news that happens late. The Frederick Board of Aldermen's Sept. 3 vote on annexations is a good example. We knew public comments on the proposals would continue well into the evening, so we on the news desk swapped deadlines with sports, which meant we had until midnight. The aldermen were expected to vote on the much-debated annexation proposals, and we wanted to get the story in.

Despite all the preparation, these stories are almost always a hurry-up-and-wait proposition. City Hall reporter Adam Behsudi called me after 11 that Thursday night from City Hall, saying that public comments were still being taken but the vote shouldn't take place any later than 11:30. With my boss, the news editor, gone for the night and the city editors and managing editor at home, I had to make a decision.

This was cutting it close, but it was still doable. The story was written except for the result of the vote. If we had the story by 11:40, we'd be fine.

At 11:40 we still didn't have the story. Behsudi e-mailed me. The subject line read: "11:45?"

We had to get the story in.

"If you hurry," I replied.

The aldermen approved the annexations, and Behsudi filed his story at 11:47 p.m. We got the story on the page, and we went to press. Simple.

It's not as easy when news breaks late at night. The July 23 helicopter crash near I-70 in which four people were killed is one example. The only reporter on duty, Pam Rigaux, had just left to cover a condominium fire in Walkersville when we received word of the crash in Washington County near the Frederick County line. I tried to reach her on her cell phone, but she was covering the fire. So we posted the information we had from The Associated Press on our website.

Staff photographer Bill Green rushed to the scene. He is an invaluable resource in these situations. Green called me to say that fire and rescue officials had confirmed that two people had died in the crash.

Then I took calls from City Editor Rob Walters and Managing Editor Terry Headlee. I told them what we knew. We decided to replate the front page and put a bulletin on the helicopter crash in the left-side "rail" under the heading Breaking News.

Our updated front page went to press shortly after midnight, and a little while later we got confirmation that a total of four people had been killed in the crash. We posted the updated information on our website. Copy Editor Jessica Gaitan deserves much of the credit for that.

There is always room for improvement in our coverage, so we huddle with our colleagues the day after to go over what we might do better next time. We could have held off on sending the reporter to cover the fire, but we had no way of knowing how serious it would be -- the blaze displaced a number of people from their homes and there was significant property damage, but no deaths or serious injuries were reported. We certainly couldn't have predicted a fatal helicopter crash only miles away near an interstate highway.

For copy editors, it's frustrating that there isn't time to get more information, or to polish these major, breaking stories, but we at The Frederick News-Post are committed to bringing you the freshest, most accurate information available.