‘Second home’: 3AW radio veteran to step back from full time reporting
After nearly three decades in the 3AW newsroom, one of the enduring voices of Melbourne radio, Denis O’Kane, has announced he is stepping back from full time news reading.
Fiona Byrne
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One of the enduring voices of Melbourne radio, Denis O’Kane, is stepping back from full time reporting and news reading.
O’Kane, 77, has been in the 3AW newsroom “this time” for 20 years as a reporter and news reader.
He will wrap his full time role at the end of the month, but will continue to do casual shifts next year.
“This is my third time here. I started here in 1981 and most of my career has been at 3AW.
I have been with the station for 27 years in total,” O’Kane said.
O’Kane informed 3AW management in June that he was ready to move to a casual role.
“When you get to my age you think ‘Wow, there are other things to do’ and as long as I can keep a toe in the radio station it will be great,” O’Kane said.
“3AW has been very special to me, it has been like a second home. We have a great culture here and it always has been the case since my involvement with the station.”
The station will host a going away dinner for O’Kane this week.
O’Kane has lived a fascinating radio life, beginning at a station in country Victoria in 1965 as an 18-year-old.
“You do everything from playing music to cleaning the toilets at country radio, it is a great training ground,” he said.
From there he moved to 5AD in Adelaide, then to Sydney and back to Melbourne to work at 3XY before joining 3AW in 1981.
He left 3AW in the mid ‘80s and went to Fox FM as news director where he stayed for three years. In 1989 he returned to 3AW as general manager, a role he held for about 18 months, before going on to work in news at 2GB, 2DayFM, ARN in Melbourne and 3AK, before rejoining 3AW in 2004.
“It gets in your blood,” O’Kane said of radio. “I just loved doing it.”
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