Plane Crash at SFO

[Wright County Guy]

What is the coverage like?

 

[landtuna]

NBC broke into the motocross racing for an initial story then again about 20 minutes later for a more in-depth story. I turned the TV off after that so don't know but assume the Nightly News had it as the lead-off story.

 

[rbrown]

KCBS and KGO had coverage of the accident.

 

[fybush]

NBC broke into the motocross racing for an initial story then again about 20 minutes later for a more in-depth story. I turned the TV off after that so don't know but assume the Nightly News had it as the lead-off story.

It was the first block of all of the network newscasts. ABC seemed to have the most extensive coverage earlier in the day; they broke in shortly after the crash and stayed on it for what seemed like the better part of an hour before going back to Wimbledon. I didn't see any cut-ins on CBS at all during the day.

The cable newsers have been on it non-stop since it happened. It looks like the San Francisco TV stations and KCBS have been, too.

 

[sfradio]

KTVU moved the giants game to TV 36 and KTVU had non-stop coverage of the crash.

 

[NoMoreLurking]

I notice KCBS has weekday anchors on today...Sunday.

 

[BarryATL]

The Atlanta All News 106.7 (a Cumulus station) was getting live updates from "sister station" KGO radio.

 

[landtuna]

KTVU moved the giants game to TV 36 and KTVU had non-stop coverage of the crash.

It has always seemed senseless to me that when an event such as this occurs some news source will go non-stop on it even though it doesn't affect near a majority of people and/or is an isolated incident.

I notice that there has been practically no national coverage of the tragic train crash and explosion in that little town in southern Quebec that literally destroyed the town. I realize it is across the border but the plane crash didn't have that many Americans on it either so how to judge which is more important?

Non-stop coverage is usually just endless repetition of what isn't yet known.

 

[fybush]

I notice that there has been practically no national coverage of the tragic train crash and explosion in that little town in southern Quebec that literally destroyed the town. I realize it is across the border but the plane crash didn't have that many Americans on it either so how to judge which is more important?

ABC had its own reporter in Lac-Megantic filing a package that was the second story on Saturday's World News. NBC had its own reporter there on Nightly last night. I didn't see much CBS over the weekend, save for a headline with video on Sunday Morning (which rarely does much beyond "a headline with video" for all but the very biggest stories.) I'm not sure how all of that qualifies as "practically no national coverage."

As for SFO, it's the first time since 2001 that we've had a commercial jetliner crash in the U.S., and only the second crash of a 777 ever. If that's not major news worthy of extensive coverage, what is?

 

[DavidEduardo]

It has always seemed senseless to me that when an event such as this occurs some news source will go non-stop on it even though it doesn't affect near a majority of people and/or is an isolated incident.

I notice that there has been practically no national coverage of the tragic train crash and explosion in that little town in southern Quebec that literally destroyed the town. I realize it is across the border but the plane crash didn't have that many Americans on it either so how to judge which is more important?

Adding to Scott's observations:

Nearly everyone travels by plane or would like to... I'd say of those who watch TV news, 100% share that commonality.

So they relate to airline accidents. Folks want to know how safe they are when they fly, whether the aircraft they fly on is airworthy, which airlines are better. That is also why we hear extensive coverage of air fare increases, baggage fees, etc. And why TV stations send a crew to the airport around holiday weekends... the subject matter connects with viewers.

Most people don't live near train tracks, so the attitude is often "well, thank God, that can't happen to me.

I often find people with fear of flying. I've never found someone with a fear of freight trains.

 

[landtuna]

As for SFO, it's the first time since 2001 that we've had a commercial jetliner crash in the U.S., and only the second crash of a 777 ever. If that's not major news worthy of extensive coverage, what is?

I don't know the difference between "extensive" and "non-stop" but constant reporting on a story in which nearly all facts are yet unknown to me is nothing but advertisement in a different form.

For instance, two were killed in the SFO crash. On Sunday an air taxi crashed in Alaska in which all ten aboard died. Seen coverage of that?

 

[fybush]

I hadn't yet, but I also have had almost no news on since that accident happened. I do recall fairly extensive coverage of the last major fatal air crash in Alaska, the 2010 crash that killed Senator Ted Stevens. A quick check shows it got coverage on NPR this morning, and I expect I'll see something about it on the evening newscasts in a few minutes. (And given how remote Soldotna is from even Alaska's TV news operations, I expect whatever coverage it gets to be limited by a lack of available video. That's just the reality of news coverage.)

As for the issue of repetitive nonstop coverage of a story like the disaster: yes, of course the amount of actual information provided in any such coverage tends, inevitably, to be rather small when compared to the airtime expended.

But what's the alternative? The broadcast networks on Saturday split the difference. I didn't see any updates on CBS at all during the day. NBC did some brief updates but otherwise stuck to regular programming. ABC stayed on the story almost nonstop from 3-ish ET until it was time for local news at 6. I can see arguments in both directions: stick with the story and even if you're not reporting much new information, you're picking up eyeballs throughout the day as people who aren't paying much attention to the TV on a Saturday afternoon happen across the coverage and want to get caught up on what you missed. Or break away, restricting your coverage to updates as warranted, but run the risk of completely missing viewers who skim across your channel when it's not on.

I don't think the issue is as complex for the cable networks. There's no "regular programming" to go back to. If the plane crash is THE story of the day - and I think there's a good case to made that it was - then you stick with it, especially on a Saturday, and especially if you've called in extra resources for the coverage.

And let's face it: anyone with even the most casual understanding of how to consume broadcast news, circa 2013, knows exactly how to process a story like this: it breaks, you get the initial headlines, and unless it's something of massive personal relevance to you ("hey, I know someone who's flying from Korea to SFO today!"), you turn off the TV or leave it in the background and get on with the rest of your life for a few hours before checking in again to see what's new. Me? I used several of those hours on Saturday afternoon to take a most satisfying nap. But while I was napping, I'm sure there were hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of viewers who hadn't heard about the crash earlier in the day and wanted a source for an update in the meantime. Why wouldn't they have expected to get that update from CNN or FNC or MSNBC?

 

[DavidEduardo]

For instance, two were killed in the SFO crash. On Sunday an air taxi crashed in Alaska in which all ten aboard died. Seen coverage of that?

Yes, I saw lots of coverage of the Alaskan incident.

Air taxi? What's an air taxi? Alaska? On the tundra somewhere? Nobody nearby? Is this like those frequent stories of a little plane landing or crashing on a highway somewhere?

Boeing. 777. Commercial flight. Hundreds on board. One of America's largest cities. Major airport. Major landmarks. Dozens and dozens of cellphone pix and videos. Lots of witnesses, talking heads, photo ops. Hospital shots, survivor interviews, anxious relative interviews.

There are all kinds of video pieces, and woven together, they are dramatic and they touch most people. While the story in Alaska has a larger number of deaths, it is remote and on basically a "private plane" and that is not the same thing... it relates poorly.

Look at a different news story: the coup d'etat in Egypt. Everyone who watches news is concerned about the Middle East. We use terms like "powder keg" in reference to the zone, and the goings-on in the region affect the price of oil, of gold, the stock market, our soldiers, and the ever-elusive World Peace. So we get extensive coverage of the goings-on in Egypt.

But if there is a coup in Ecuador this afternoon, the story is likely to receive no coverage on CBS, NBC and ABC, and little to no mention on the cable outlets. It does not relate to "anyone". Worse even: a coup in Burkina Faso. Nobody knows where it is, and fewer people care. It's all about relevance.

Anecdotally, I have made perhaps 40 flights on Triple 7's, have flown into SFO many times, know the Bay Area well, and have earned just under 4 million frequent flier miles in the last 20 years. I watched the Asiana crash story for hours, and later watched the updates frequently. All of that time I was mesmerized by the story of how so many survived the incident, and I related to the story with the same kind of bonding that passengers on a delayed flight seem to develop... a shared experience; in this case shared by anyone who has ever ridden a bunch of aluminum a few miles up in the air.

 

[landtuna]

Anecdotally, I have made perhaps 40 flights on Triple 7's, have flown into SFO many times, know the Bay Area well, and have earned just under 4 million frequent flier miles in the last 20 years. I watched the Asiana crash story for hours, and later watched the updates frequently. All of that time I was mesmerized by the story of how so many survived the incident, and I related to the story with the same kind of bonding that passengers on a delayed flight seem to develop... a shared experience; in this case shared by anyone who has ever ridden a bunch of aluminum a few miles up in the air.

I get the "relevance" part but, as with your previous remark about trains - this was an overseas originating flight, few Americans aboard and even from the outset they were reporting a significant number of survivors.

It's like the difference between a major fire in Dallas and New York. You can bet New York will be covered far longer and deeper than Dallas all other facts being similar.

I took my first airplane flight from SFO and used to fly in and out of that airport a lot. It always impressed me upon approach that everything was water until the very last moment and it seemed the plane touched down just feet from the seawall. I have never forgotten that - or the Western Airlines Electra (4-engine turboprop) plane that took off and just off the runway two starboard engines quit. That plane was full of sailors, including me, and several rows of nuns and the comments from each was diverse and humorous. So I have a special attachment to SFO as well.

Even so, the continuous coverage seems to me to be nothing more than "we've got nothing on right now so let's go with the most exciting/spectacular thing we can cover".

After all, SFO is a long way from most people in the country too.

I thought NBC did a good job - break in a couple times, give known info and get out then cover in depth in regular news slot.

Me? I get my (national) news almost exclusively via the Net these days. The local car crash stuff is not important and the network news hasn't the time to cover big stories in enough depth.

 

[fybush]

Just watched the A block of NBC Nightly, and it was almost exactly what I would have predicted: two packages off the top on SFO, one updating the investigation and a second one about the survivors and the two victims. The second story was Alaska, which was a VO over several still photos. (I'd have bet on at least a little video, but maybe I underestimated the remoteness of Soldotna). The Quebec train derailment was third, with a package form a reporter on scene. Then Egypt, again with a reporter package. They teased Zimmerman coverage before the break and that's when I moved on.

It's fashionable these days to deride the network nightly newscasts as obsolete dinosaurs, and I fully understand why someone in the Mountain or Pacific (or Arizona!) time zones would find them dated on arrival two or three hours later. But as someone whose schedule typically does find me near a TV at 6:30 eastern, I still find considerable value in a concise, carefully-edited, professionally-reported summary of the day's big events. If someone handed me CNN to run, I'd probably structure it so that each hour of programming starts out with just such a summary. They're deploying most of the resources to do that anyway, and it would be a useful point of differentiation against the competition.

 

[landtuna]

It's fashionable these days to deride the network nightly newscasts as obsolete dinosaurs, and I fully understand why someone in the Mountain or Pacific (or Arizona!) time zones would find them dated on arrival two or three hours later. But as someone whose schedule typically does find me near a TV at 6:30 eastern, I still find considerable value in a concise, carefully-edited, professionally-reported summary of the day's big events. If someone handed me CNN to run, I'd probably structure it so that each hour of programming starts out with just such a summary. They're deploying most of the resources to do that anyway, and it would be a useful point of differentiation against the competition.

Don't get me wrong, I was not deriding NBC's coverage yesterday at all (with the possible exception of the Quebec train wreck). I thought they did a good job. I haven't seen tonight's Nightly yet but if it remains as you described it is also proper reporting. What I do object to in the half-hour news reports is the last story - typically a fluff piece on "person of the week" or summat. There are news magazines for that kind of stuff.

 

[MarcB]

KCBS and KGO had coverage of the accident.

WTIC AM 1080 in Hartford, CT was simulcasting KCBS (740/106.9?). Initially they were even carrying KCBS's commercials and traffic reports, but then they began covering those up.

 

[david]

CBS Evening News: Plane Crash at SFO

I still find considerable value in a concise, carefully-edited, professionally-reported summary of the day's big events.

Bravo Scott! The evening news indeed provides "concise, carefully-edited, professionally-reported summary of the day's big events" coupled with a feel-good story to wrap up the half-hour broadcast. My DVR is programmed to record the CBS Evening News with Scott Pelley every weeknight and that allows me to skip the irrelevant stuff (Zimmerman, et al) and focus just on the stories that matter most to me and my family. Nearly every evening my 3 young kids are drawn to the newscast as a result of stories that peek their interest.

Those who say the network evening news don't have any draw except to the 55+ demo simply don't understand its potential appeal if exposure was provided more broadly in American households. For example, every Friday the CBS Evening News concludes with another installment of On The Road with Steve Hartman - www.cbsnews.com/evening-news/on-the-road - feel good television at its best!

 

[landtuna]

I would argue that it was a bigger international story in large part because it indeed was an overseas flight that had a large number of non-Americans aboard.

As David said, relevance is most important in news coverage. Next time an aircraft goes down in the jungles of South America or the hinterlands of Russia see how much news coverage it gets in mainland USA. The only reason it would be covered in detail is if there were a significant number of Americans aboard or the only American aboard was significant (like the politician in Alaska for instance).

Also, part of the early coverage included who wasn't on the flight (specifically, Facebook's COO).

This particular piece of information wasn't news. This was someone desperately searching for a story where there wasn't one. People missing a crashed flight may be considered very good fortune but it isn't news.

In addition, the tragedy in Lac-Megantic is still getting a lot of coverage globally; see http://news.ca.msn.com/canada/quebec-train-fire-dominates-world-news.

Not here it didn't and not nearly as much coverage as the much less serious SFO crash.

 

[stewie]

I read someone else comment on the flight not having many Americans on it so why so much coverage? That argument collapses on itself since its local to SFO, you can easily justify "wall to wall" coverage.

How many American's died in the runaway freight train?

As for the cable outlets, what's going to draw more viewers? Middle of the day Saturday programming or breaking news?