Disaster in Truth and Reporting Essay

Submitted By maxeys17
Words: 662
Pages: 3
Open Document
Disaster in Truth and Reporting
Hurricane Katrina was the second strongest hurricane in the United States. As early as August 26, 2005, Louisiana had been declared a state of emergency with landfall of the hurricane hitting the United States on August 29, 2005. Katrina was a slow moving hurricane which is worse than a faster moving hurricane due to the fact the storm stays over the same area longer. Storm surge waves came in and at their highest point they were twenty five feet in height. This broke the previously set record in 1969 (Surviving Katrina). Rainfall amounts exceeded eight and ten inches along the hurricane path. These statistics were the beginning of the costliest hurricanes in the United States history and was the beginning of a media firestorm in the aftermath of the hurricane. In an effort to be the first to report information, reporters spewed out information at a high rate of speed without checking the validity of all the reports.
Matt Welch’s article “They Shoot Helicopters, Don’t They?” stated that the main cause of false reports were due to the severe communication breakdown. Not only did reporters fail to not believe every story and report the story, they were overzealous in wanting to be the first to report the story. A news article about shots being fired at military helicopters surfaced and spread like wildfire. Celebrities like Tiger Woods even commented about the outrageousness of such attack which also leads to people perceiving the story as true. This inaccurate reporting also led to delays in proper emergency and law enforcement responses.
Brian Thevenot’s article “Myth-Making in New Orleans” was written due to his experience of his own lack of research in stories before reporting them. He was along first hand with soldiers that could have debunked a story of thirty to forty bodies in a freezer if he had only followed through with investigating. They all chose not to open the freezer to see what was inside and believed that the bodies were in there based on someone else’s report. Although he corrected the story of the freezer report as well as many of the other countless erroneous reports of the aftermath of hurricane Katrina, his correction led to many other corrections. These corrections led others to perceive that the media was quick to make judgments about the victims based upon their ethnicity as well as their class.
Welch and Thevenot’s articles both had a tone that led me to rethink the old saying “can’t believe everything you hear.” They both talked about how much confusion and problems that the false reporting created. Welch made no qualms about saying that reporters failed themselves for
Show More

Related Documents: Disaster in Truth and Reporting Essay

vthai assignment1 Essay

revenues or reported sales that weren't sales, it would signal to investors that based on their strong financial reporting, their stock would appear as a good investment to invest in, or from a creditor point of view, a good company to loan money to. While stretching the truth with "creative accounting" may yield short term results, the ethical implications if exposed or revealed can spell disaster for a company. The company would be at risk of law suits from misleading the public. They could be in trouble…

Words 889 - Pages 4

9/11 Research Paper

view and the story is still hard to recall. These attacks and the global response to them have brought a great change and shaped the world we live in. After 9/11, the media itself has changed. As the world was investigating who is to blame for the disaster of 9/11, the media responded in a manner portraying the official stances of the country from which it is functioning. As the suspicion of the attack was on the Islamic terrorist group Al-Qaida, the American based media group and some Western countries…

Words 1912 - Pages 8

Essay on Negligence and plagiarizm

was consciously inventing and plagiarizing information for several years while working for a respected newspaper. Mr. Therevont was involved in negligence. His fiction was a result of broken communications in the New Orleans region right after the disaster happened and it was hard to confirm the information. He wrote Bodies Piled in Freezer at Convention Center article after interviewing victims and witnesses, whose words were mostly based on other people's reports. When it comes to retelling other…

Words 585 - Pages 3

Calendar Planner

to manage your marketing activities will not give you the visibility you need in today’s competitive environment. A marketing calendar should be fully integrated with all your marketing activities to give your marketing department one view of the truth. Here are four reasons why: 1. Marketing is Responsive The idea of marketing responsiveness is epitomized by Zara, the Spanish fashion powerhouse. Their cycle time from idea, to production, to distribution at point of sale is two and a half weeks…

Words 531 - Pages 3

Upton Sinclair's 'The Jungle'

The Jungle by Upton Sinclair is a literary work describing human nature exposing truths of the wrongs done to people of America and is representative of all workers of the time. It is a very depressing realization of how unregulated capitalists corporations and monopolies treated human beings as wage slaves with complete disregard for the workers well-being. Throughout the book, Sinclair shows the struggles of an American family in order to show the failings in American society. **(A little about…

Words 653 - Pages 3

Essay Chernobyl: Chernobyl Disaster and Reactor

The Clean Up. The first alarm was set 5 minutes after the explosion, 5 minutes later the first firemen were on the scene. They battled the fire wearing the correct protective gear- they poured tonnes of water on the fire but nothing seemed to put the fire out. They were all exposed to lethal amounts of radiation. Two men died that night and 28 men died later on in the coming months, they are the first victims of Chernobyl. For the next 7 months 500,000 men will forge a hand to hand battle with…

Words 2473 - Pages 10

1Why Have Concerns Over Pollution Becom Hellip Essay

are involved within environmental issues. For example, Companies’ management and directors provide accounting guidance regarding display and disclosure of certain pollution remediation obligations and setting forth the methods for measuring and reporting pollution remediation liabilities. Pollution issue is close related to the company’s reputation and profitability In generally, management and directors became to realize that bad environmental practices would not only harm environment, but in…

Words 1066 - Pages 5

Coummunity Research Essay

discovered. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Peach County’s population is racially reported and categorized by White persons 48.3%, Black persons 45.9%, and the remaining 5.8% includes Hispanic, Native American or Alaskan Native, Asian, or persons reporting being from more than one race. It is estimated each home has 3.07 persons per household compared to the state average of 2.66 persons per household (U.S. Census Bureau, 2012). Fort Valley, Georgia is the county seat of Peach County. The population…

Words 2986 - Pages 12

Accounting and Risk Essay

Introduction Over the years, people gradually realized that different types of risks existing in different departments within an organization from the risk management practices. Some of them overlap can amplify risk, while others may offset to reduce risk. Therefore, the enterprise can not only consider their risk management from the perspective of a single risk, but from the view of the institution ’ s overall risk profile. In recent years, the consequent collapse of Enron, WorldCom and a set of…

Words 3026 - Pages 13

Testimonies Book Report

On the other hand, Svetlana Aleksievich shows the relevance and power of oral history in documenting the aftermath of the Chernobyl 1986 disaster with similar ecological effects and social consequences associated with the nuclear tests in the Pacific. Aleksievich utilises oral history to present a more inviting representation of such technological disasters, and offers a more humane understanding through the use of emotion as an interpretive lens, as testimonies assist individuals to make sense…

Words 1303 - Pages 6