John Ryan
Reporter
About
Environment reporter John Ryan welcomes tips, documents and feedback from listeners. Reach him at jryan@kuow.org or for secure, confidential communication: he's at 1-401-405-1206 on the Signal messaging app or heyjohnryan@protonmail.com.
Good thing John was a clumsy traveler.
Otherwise his cheap microcassette recorder wouldn't have fallen out of his pocket in an Indonesian taxi, a generous BBC stringer wouldn't have lent him some recording gear, and he wouldn't have gotten the radio bug. But after pointing a mic at rare jungle songbirds and gong-playing grandmothers for his first radio story, there was no turning back.
Two decades later, he has freelanced for most of the major public radio news shows as well as newspapers and magazines and covered transportation at the Seattle Daily Journal of Commerce. He’s been a reporter at NPR stations in southeast and southwest Alaska (KTOO-Juneau and KUCB-Unalaska) as well as Seattle. He became KUOW’s first full-time investigative reporter in 2009 and one of the first shop stewards for KUOW’s SAG-AFTRA newsroom union, as well as KUOW’s full-time environment reporter, in 2018.
John’s stories have won multiple national awards for KUOW, including the Society of Professional Journalists' Sigma Delta Chi awards for Public Service in Radio Journalism and for Investigative Reporting, national Edward R. Murrow and PMJA/PRNDI awards for coverage of breaking news and a Society of Environmental Journalists award for in-depth reporting.
He believes democracy only works when journalism holds the powerful accountable for their words and actions.
Stories
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West Seattle Bridge to be repaired, not replaced
Mayor Jenny Durkan said a repaired bridge could reopen to traffic by “mid-2022.”
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Washington restaurants brace for thousands of layoffs with ban on indoor service
"It is definitely a hard pill to swallow when it comes to your business."
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U.S. out of global climate pact — an 'appalling' move, WA leaders say
“We're really concerned about the crab and clams and oysters and all those things that are extremely important to our way of life.”
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KUOW Newsroom
Expensive choice: Fly home to Texas or your vote doesn't get counted
University of Washington junior Carson Bryant joined a surge of college students and others who have descended upon Texas.
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KUOW Newsroom
'Unlike any other year': Campaign cash spikes across Washington state in 2020
Cash has poured into this year’s elections like never before.
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More mail slowdowns as Election Day nears
Postal customers, members of Congress and Washington's attorney general say mail is moving slowly in many places.
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'Like Covid every year': doctors, nurses urge fast action to save the climate
More than 4,000 U.S. doctors and nurses are urging their patients to push for action on climate change.
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KUOW Newsroom
Get on up: In a landslide, it might save your life
Rainy season is also landslide season in the Northwest. A few simple actions can dramatically boost your chances of survival.
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Third Covid-19 surge hits western Washington
Public health officials say a third surge of coronavirus cases is hitting western Washington.
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Climate choice 2020: Trump’s 'wrecking ball' vs. Biden’s mixed record
Three days in from the trailhead, we weren’t sure what to do when the wildfire smoke got thick. Hiking deeper into the Olympic wilderness, toward the apparent source of the smoke, seemed a bad idea.