Photojournalists
Joel Thurston
Better know as "Joelcam" on WCCO This Morning, Joel works the early morning shift.
He was born and raised in St. Louis Park, Minn. His first chance to get behind a camera was in fifth grade, video taping the St. Louis Park Orioles High School hockey team.
While attending St. Cloud State University for mass communications, Joel worked at the campus TV station and drove the Zamboni at the campus ice rink. He also interned in the WCCO St. Cloud newsroom and covered news stories all over central Minnesota.
After graduating, he worked for Midwest Sports Channel in Minneapolis. He missed chasing breaking news with a camera and found an opening at KTTC-TV, the NBC station in Rochester, Minn.
His first day on the job he video taped a plane crashing at the local airport, and went into a burning house for a local fire department training exercise. He worked for two years in southeastern Minnesota before returning to the Twin Cities and WCCO.
Joel and his wife Jennifer (another St. Cloud grad) have two boys and a cat. In his free time, you can find him geocaching, cheering for his favorite hockey teams (Go Wild and Huskies!) and playing with his boys. He also loves to cook.