Perth broadcasting icon and ABC radio breakfast host Russell Woolf dies suddenly at 57

‘Larger-than-life’ ABC radio talk show host and one-time ABC TV weather presenter’s sudden death leaves colleagues reeling.

Russell Woolf. Picture: Karin Calvert

Perth radio listeners have poured their hearts out over the death of one of the ABC’s most popular broadcasters, the gregarious Russell Woolf.

Tributes to the 57-year-old ­became an ode to the intimacy ­between breakfast radio presenter and listener on Tuesday.

The ABC’s former Europe correspondent Geoff Hutchison told listeners Woolf went to bed on Monday night and did not wake up on Tuesday morning.

Woolf was the ABC’s serving breakfast show host in Western Australia, a former Drive host and a weather presenter with a ­difference between 2007 and 2011: at a time when commercial television routinely hired impeccably dressed young women for their weather segments, Woolf was beefy and tieless. The audience adored him.

Fans shared stories about his kindness, the joy of listening to him and the fun of meeting him. He entertained strangers in a ­secret smokers’ shed at the WACA during a Test match. He launched a book of poems for one listener’s son at a suburban lawn bowls club.

“It’s like losing a member of the family,” one man said.

“I will miss waking up to Rusty’s voice,” said another.

Woolf’s program was the leading talk show in the breakfast timeslot. He is survived by his wife Kylie and their daughter Bronte.