Longtime AP Technician Bryan Nichols Dead At 55

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Bryan Keith Nichols, who spent 17 years as a New Orleans-based communications technician for The Associated Press, has died at his home in Fort Walton Beach, Fla., after a long battle with cancer.

Nichols, who was 55, died Tuesday.

Nichols began working for the AP in 1982 and developed a reputation among AP staffers and the news cooperative's newspaper and broadcast members in Louisiana and Mississippi as one who could tackle any technological challenge. As former New Orleans bureau chief Charlotte Porter put it: "It seemed as though he could fix anything."

Nichols is survived by his parents, three siblings, wife Lucy and three children. No funeral was planned.