• Demetria Obilor is a Traffic Ensemble Anchor best known for her work on ABC's Channel 8, also known as Traffic Bae.
• She has a mixed ethnicity with a father from Nigeria and a mother of German-Lithuanian-Russian descent.
• Her career began as a traffic reporter for KSHB-TV, then KLAS-TV in Las Vegas, and finally WFAA-TV in Dallas.
• She became the target of racist and body-shaming abuse and was defended by Chance the Rapper.
• Her net worth is estimated to be over $200,000.
Contents
Demetria Obilor is an American Traffic Ensemble Anchor, best known for her work on ABC’s Channel 8. Known as Traffic Bae. In 2017 she made headlines when her response to being body-shamed by a viewer went viral.
Early life, family, educational background
Demetria Obilor was born on 29 March 1991, in Kansas City, Missouri USA. She is of American nationality, and has mixed ethnicity, her father being a Nigerian with African ancestry and her mother having a German-Lithuanian-Russian background of white descent. She grew up in Kansas alongside three brothers, Uzoma, Ikenna Obilor and Kelechi Obilor. In 2005, when she was a teenager, their family moved to Las Vegas, Nevada US.
Speaking about her academic qualifications, she came back to her hometown to enroll in Johnson County Community College in 2009, and a year later she transferred to the University of Kansas, obtaining a bachelor’s degree in Broadcast Journalism in 2012.
Career
Kansas
Obilor’s journalist career started while she was still a student at Kansas. She worked for the college’s station KUHJ-TV, as an off-screen writer and graphics creator for new packages, while also performing stand-ups and live interviews and covering various stories for the station.
In 2011 she began working at the NBC affiliate station in Kansas named KSHB-TV, being a production technician. She kept the job after her graduation, getting a promotion and becoming a traffic reporter for morning news segments in 2013, compiling and reporting on relevant traffic information, which started her career as an onscreen journalist.
While at KSHB, Obilor also worked for the station social media department, on increasing the social media presence, which she successfully managed. The number of station’s followers on Twitter grew from 0 to over 1000 while she worked there.
She quit working at KSBH-TV to join her family in Las Vegas.
Las Vegas
In 2014 Obilor began working as a traffic reporter for the CBS affiliate station in Las Vegas KLAS-TV, presenting traffic information about the Las Vegas Valley on the “8 News Now” weekend morning show. She was also a part of the station’s social media segment entitled “Trending Now”, as a host and producer, and of a franchised segment entitled “What’s Driving You Crazy?”, as a writer, host and producer.
During this time, Obilor did a little modelling too, participating in the Las Vegas Container Park Fashion Show, presenting dresses inspired by the shops around the shopping center. She won the show’s grand prize, and People’s Choice Awards.
Dallas
After three years in Vegas, she moved to Dallas, Texas, joining the WFAA-TV Channel 8 as a Traffic Ensemble Anchor for the station’s morning segment entitled “Day Break”. In addition, she hosted a segment on social media called “Speed Feed”.
Obilor left Channel 8 in late 2019, expressing in her Twitter post her desire to pursue new opportunities, which haven’t yet been revealed.
Body-image
During her time at WFAA, she became the target of racist and body-shaming abuse, being criticized for her dressing and her plus size body shape by a Facebook user, who said that she looks ridiculous. The nasty comments led to national online outrage from people who disagreed with them. Among those who came to Obilor’s defense was the famous rapper Chance the Rapper, who retweeted the post, collecting over 100,000 likes. Consequently, Obilor shared a response video speaking against body shaming, and calling for more tolerance of people looking different to one another, which garnered many retweets and was praised by numerous fans. This was not the only time that Obilor was subject to such a situation.
During her work as a traffic reporter back in Las Vegas, she shared a screenshot of an email from a viewer, which had racial undertones about her hair. Namely, a woman behind the email said that Obilor’s natural hairstyle must be hard to clean and ‘smell bad’. The post went viral as the numerous fans tweeted back to Obilor with compliments.
Hosting career
In addition to being a traffic anchor, Obilor has hosted events such as the Las Vegas Beauty in Beauty Out (BIBO) Awards, Cyril Wengert Elementary’s Reading Rangers, McDonalds Green for Grads, Blue Valley Blue Streaks 25th annual Special Olympics Bowl.A.Thon & Silent Auction in Overland Park, Kansas, to name a few. She was also a host of a youth radio show called Generation Rap for KPRS Hot103 Jamz.
All black everything ? pic.twitter.com/JnwhPfh4Es
— Demetria Obilor (@DemetriaObilor) December 26, 2019
Personal life
When speaking about Obilor’s romantic life, there are no details about it revealed to the media. She has not shared any information regarding her past or current relationships. Her social media posts suggest that she is single, has never married and doesn’t have children.
Physical appearance
The popular TV reporter is 5ft 4ins (1.63m) tall and weighs around 136 lbs (62kg). She wears shoe size 8. Her other body measurements have not been revealed to sources. She has a curvy body type and an attractive plus size shape, brown eyes and brown hair.
Interesting facts
- Obilor is very active on social media. She has more than 670,000 followers on Instagram, and over 160,000 Twitter followers.
- Her hobbies are travelling and watching movies, her favorite genres being horror and gangster movies.
- Her favorite food is spicy food, while her favorite candy is pull-n-peel twizzlers.
- Obilor’s favorite color is red.
- Her favorite holiday is Halloween.
Net worth
Obilor’s net worth as of early 2020 is estimated at over $200,000, most of which has been earned through her career as a TV reporter.
Source: IMDb, Wikipedia
