10 Over 50: Vanessa Echols
Meet Vaness Echols, former WFTV News Anchor!
Courtesy LinkedIn
Vanessa Echols
After 30 years as one of the faces of news in Orlando, Echols retired and wrote the unique book/devotional/journal “We’re in Heaven, and I Have Some Questions,” which invites readers to explore the Bible.
About Vanessa:
Vanessa Lorraine Echols is a former television journalist and was the noon and 4pm news anchor at WFTV in Orlando until her retirement on May 25, 2022.
Echols was born in Auburn, Alabama, attending Auburn High School and later majoring in broadcast journalism at the University of Alabama. She subsequently worked for a radio station in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, and television stations in Georgia and Tennessee, including WMAZ-TV in Macon, Georgia. In 1992, Echols began anchoring WFTV’s Eyewitness News Daybreak and Eyewitness News at Noon. In 2007, she was named anchor of a new morning news program, Eyewitness News This Morning, on WFTV’s sister station WRDQ.
Echols is a breast cancer survivor, and has served as honorary chairman for the Susan G. Komen Central Florida Race for the Cure and was keynote speaker for the University of Central Florida’s 2006 Breast Cancer Update conference.
About 10 Over 50:
Orlando magazine’s 2022 10 Over 50 List honors those changemakers in the community over 50 who continue to make a difference in Central Florida.
