False report gives false hope
By Lisa Moreno
On Jan. 4, the San Jose Mercury News arrived on my doorstep with the headline, "Miners found alive." With the newspaper in one hand and the TV remote in the other, I tuned into the morning news and found myself in the middle of a frightening contradiction.
Two days earlier, an explosion shook the Sago mine in West Virginia, trapping 13 men underground. It was speculated that even if the men survived the initial blast, they would still have to overcome the deadly levels of carbon monoxide that exist below the earth's surface.
These fears were confirmed when we learned that 12 of the miners were killed while the 13th remains in critical condition.
Tragedies are always difficult to overcome, but when families of the victims are given a false sense of hope, the pain can be exacerbated.
Mike Fetters, a spokesman for the Newseum, a Washington, D.C.-based media museum, says that more than half of the 250 U.S. newspapers examined by the museum staff on Wednesday published front-page stories that said the miners were alive.
The Washington Post continues to defend its reporting on the tragedy, while George de Lama, deputy managing editor for the Chicago Tribune, says, "This (was) not a good day for news organizations."
Several papers including The New York Times and USA Today, both said they believed their facts were correct at the time of publication. The information on which they based their story was supposedly coming from workers, officials and family members.
In a situation where reporters were unable to crawl into the mineshaft themselves and look for the miners, it seems altogether logical and practical that they would depend on the word of other qualified parties. But in this case, it did not work out that way.
There is no easy answer or quick remedy for media management. If the people who report our news cannot come up with an equation to determine when a story is complete or incomplete, then how can media consumers trust what they read and hear?
It appears to be a Catch-22 for media organizations. If they report on a story without sufficient verification, they are deemed careless and irresponsible.
But in our media-saturated society where around-the-clock news is expected, a news organization cannot afford to be last with a story. This is one situation where media competition harms the public.
The tragedy that has occurred in West Virginia should call into question the necessity for around-the-clock news coverage. When information sources are competing for deadlines and shock value, the people involved in the stories are often overlooked and end up paying the price.
Lisa Moreno is a senior communication major.