Suddenly , they found themselves covering a very different story . For CNN , it all started in early April when Alec Miran , CNN 's special events producer for the Gorbachev visit , went to Beijing to propose an `` outlandish idea '' to the Chinese authorities -- bringing in the network 's own transmission equipment to beam live television pictures from China . `` It was unprecedented , '' said Miran . Before that , networks would feed their material from CCTV -LRB- Chinese Central Television -RRB- , who would monitor -- and censor -- everything that was sent out . `` Our own transmission was a scary idea to them , '' said Miran . But he says he thinks the Chinese eventually agreed -- after much back and forth -- because , above all , they wanted international coverage of Gorbachev 's visit . The Chinese gave CNN permission to bring in their own `` flyaway '' satellite dish and additional microwave gear to be able to transmit live -- a permission unheard of at the time in closed , Communist China . CNN was granted exactly one week 's permission , timed to coincide with
-LRB- CNN -RRB- -- For CNN , Tiananmen Square was a watershed story -- a seminal moment in the network 's history . Beijing bureau chief Mike Chinoy , producer Nancy Lane and Moscow bureau chief Steve Hurst Only nine years old in 1989 , CNN was the only 24-hour news station on the air at the time . But staffers say the network suffered an inferiority complex when comparing itself to the major players in American television , who had dismissed the new upstart for years as `` Chicken Noodle News . '' Enter Tiananmen Square . Change the face of television news . Take your place in the big leagues . `` It put CNN on the map , '' said Mike Chinoy , CNN 's Beijing bureau chief during the crisis . `` It was the first time an upheaval in a previously isolated , distant , inaccessible location suddenly was available on television sets in living rooms and foreign ministries around the world . It was a pivotal moment for television . '' And it was an accident too . Foreign reporters had flooded Beijing to cover the historic visit of Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev .