On empty roads in west Baghdad, an army platoon scours for bombs. Trucks roll past dimly lit buildings, vacant lots and a dead man face down in the garbage by a highway overpass.

NPR's Corey Flintoff spent five weeks in Iraq reporting scenes like this one. He covered the burial of Saddam Hussein, child labor among poor families, changes in Iraq's nightlife, and more.

Since then, he's returned to his post as a newscaster for All Things Considered. He visited Poynter this week to talk about his experiences covering the war. He'll join a panel on journalists and war later this week at the University of South Florida in St. Petersburg.

Flintoff sat down to chat with Poynter Online's Leann Frola, Meg Martin and Bill Mitchell. To hear the entire conversation, click on the podcast to the right. Read on for some excerpts.

So what was a typical day like reporting in Baghdad? Flintoff spent much of it reporting and producing his work: lining up sources for interviews, looking for units to embed with and talking to his editor.


He stayed outside the Green Zone in a house big enough for 18 people. It's a villa surrounded by compounds housing Iraqi government officials and other news organizations, all protected by private security guards. NPR doesn't have its own guards, Flintoff says. But he still felt safe.


Reporting on the reality of Iraqis' lives was challenging. He's not fluent in Arabic. He often was embedded with troops. And he heard from TV reporters who said they couldn't stay in one spot for more than 15 minutes for fear of being tracked.

Because of the city's instability, Flintoff says he didn't get to interact much with the people there. He relied on local Iraqi reporters to do most of the reporting on the street.


Secondhand information isn't ideal. But Flintoff says he had to go with his gut feeling that the Iraqi reporters he worked with could be trusted. They'd been with NPR for a while, he says, and have a reputation for doing great work.


Out in the field, Flintoff heard the bombs, saw the bodies and experienced the deaths of his sources. But on the job, he says, all that didn't matter. He was absorbed in getting the story.

But after the sound had been monitored, the voices recorded and the background noise captured, reality would set in back at the compound.


Like the day he found out a bomb blew up on three of those soldiers looking for explosives in west Baghdad.

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"A Conversation with Corey Flintoff," by Pat Walters Journalists & War, University of South Floida

Flintoff doesn't try to hide his affection toward the troops. "I can say right off the bat that I liked these guys," he said in one of his stories.

They fed him and housed him, made sure he was protected. And in a war where being embedded is often the best option, Flintoff says, he was grateful.


Handling unnamed sources is another ethical issue Flintoff faced. He says he was reluctant to use a source he hadn't talked to directly. He also had to ax interviews he recorded to protect sources who knew more than what officials were reporting.


Flintoff says journalists should be cautious of recent reports about Iran's role in the war as well. He says he's skeptical of the "so called" evidence that Iran is providing roadside bombs that are killing soldiers like the ones he interviewed. You just don't know when you can't see it for yourself, he says.


Despite the dangers of the city and the 120-degree weather, Flintoff says he's itching to return -- to reporting and to Baghdad.


He's already brainstorming for future coverage. On his list: investigating a state department program that was highly touted and then fell off the map.


And we look forward to listening.