Like many people, I went to sleep last night believing twelve of the thirteen West Virginia miners survived the mine explosion, only to learn this morning they had not. But as I watch network news correspondents asking mine officials what went wrong, I for one want to ask these news agencies the same thing.
It’s obvious there was a tragic miscommunication between rescue crews and the families of the miners. But what about the miscommunication between network news and millions of viewers?
Late last night, NBC (and I’m sure their peers as well) ran a ticker announcing that twelve of the miners were alive. Did that mean they were alive and out of the mine, or alive and still trapped? It was all a bit vague. So I swallowed my better judgment and flipped to CNN for details. Handsome Anderson Cooper stood right beside the mine, but he didn’t know anything else either. Of course, that didn’t stop these news whores from reporting obviously sketchy information as fact and bringing out their resident "experts" for even more speculation.
I shouldn’t be surprised. The transition from "get it right" to "get it first" has been in motion for years, but even at this low ebb of news reporting last night’s events seem pretty egregious.
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