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TYNDALL HEADLINE: HIGHLIGHTS FROM JUNE 4, 2010
Comparisons between the Gulf of Mexico's oil disaster and the region's devastation from Hurricane Katrina in 2005 abound. As far as the network news is concerned, BP's crude oil leak does not yet rival the failure of New Orleans' levees. Not yet. At the end of its seventh week of coverage, the oil disaster has compiled a massive total of ten hours of coverage on the broadcast networks' weekday nightly newscasts (600 min--ABC 180, CBS 189, NBC 231), By contrast, Katrina logged a still greater 846 minutes in its first seven weeks, with NBC (345 min v ABC 241, CBS 257) taking the lead for that disaster too. The difference is that Katrina's coverage declined as time passed (from a weekly peak of 263 min to 213 to 145 to 73 to 70 to 55); the oil spill is gathering momentum (from 23 min to 71 to 56 to 62 to 81 to the last two weeks' totals of 154 min and 153). At this rate, the oil spill should be a bigger story than Katrina by midsummer. By that time, the oil spill would be overcovered: Katrina drowned a city and killed more than 1,800 people; BP's pollution has, so far, seen just eleven deaths.
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BP’S OIL SLICK CLOSES IN ON KATRINA’S FLOODS Comparisons between the Gulf of Mexico's oil disaster and the region's devastation from Hurricane Katrina in 2005 abound. As far as the network news is concerned, BP's crude oil leak does not yet rival the failure of New Orleans' levees. Not yet. At the end of its seventh week of coverage, the oil disaster has compiled a massive total of ten hours of coverage on the broadcast networks' weekday nightly newscasts (600 min--ABC 180, CBS 189, NBC 231), By contrast, Katrina logged a still greater 846 minutes in its first seven weeks, with NBC (345 min v ABC 241, CBS 257) taking the lead for that disaster too. The difference is that Katrina's coverage declined as time passed (from a weekly peak of 263 min to 213 to 145 to 73 to 70 to 55); the oil spill is gathering momentum (from 23 min to 71 to 56 to 62 to 81 to the last two weeks' totals of 154 min and 153). At this rate, the oil spill should be a bigger story than Katrina by midsummer. By that time, the oil spill would be overcovered: Katrina drowned a city and killed more than 1,800 people; BP's pollution has, so far, seen just eleven deaths.
Friday's lead story from Louisiana for both CBS and ABC did not concern damage to human beings at all. We saw both ABC's Matt Gutman and CBS' Mark Strassmann on their cellphones to BP's hotline to notify them of the GPS location of oil-slimed brown pelicans. Gutman described "feathers basted in oil the consistency of molasses." Strassmann reported back to his anchor Katie Couric: "It looked terrible, pathetic." On NBC, Kerry Sanders detailed the broader consequences for wildlife, pointing out that slimed marshland is a stopover for millions of migrating birds. Franz Joseph Land (in the Barents Sea) will suffer, he warned, as its tundra will be bereft of sanderlings, red knots and terns, all slimed in Louisiana's "goopy ooze" instead.
SUNTAN OIL In normal circumstances, the pristine beaches of Pensacola in the first week of June would have been a dream assignment for a correspondent. Of course, assignments are rarely made when things are dreamy. So Florida-based reporters Mark Potter of NBC and Kelly Cobiella of CBS went beachcombing for tar balls along with Good Morning America weathercaster Sam Champion for ABC: "It is a $60bn tourism industry here in Florida," Campion reckoned. "People come to Pensacola for the sun, the waves and the white sandy beaches but this morning they got something else…oily globs."
BP FACES BILLIONS IN FINES NBC decided to lead with the seadbed video of BP's robot submarines attaching a containment cap to siphon off crude from the leaking pipe to a surface ship. Anne Thompson got technical with us, explaining how warm water and methanol were being pumped down to prevent hydrate crystals from forming in the frigid deep sea water. Such crystals would clog the siphon, forcing the oil to continue to gush outwards. Only after the pipe is crystal free would vents, through which crude continues to escape, be closed and the surfacebound volume increase.
Sharyl Attkisson, in CBS' Washington bureau, offered her insight into why BP would have an interest in minimizing the volume of the leak. The corporation faces a fine of $4,300 for each day for each barrel that leaks. Last week, Attkisson reported, the Department of the Interior published a BP estimate that the volume of the leak was between 12K and 19K barrels each day, a $2bn fine so far. "Spinning the numbers," was how Attkisson put it. It turns out that those figures were BP's estimates for the minimum size of the leak: "The upper end of the range, a maximum, has not yet been released."
Speaking of BP's underestimate of the scope of the calamity, NBC's Thompson reminded us that CEO Tony Hayward had claimed that there was "no scientific evidence" that gigantic plumes of crude oil were forming in Gulf of Mexico waters. She quoted a University of South Florida finding that corrected the CEO: "Lab tests confirm the existence of two massive layers of oil droplets far beneath the surface of the sea."
ABC's Bill Weir filed a brief profile of CEO Hayward, the triathlon running, soccer supporting, downhill skiing, global yachtsman with a $4.5m annual salary. Weir dug up a self-incriminatory Hayward soundbite from a Stanford University seminar last summer in which he boasted that he had scaled back BP's commitment to environmental sustainability: "We had too many people that were working to save the world. We, sort of, lost track of the fact that our primary purpose in life is to create value for our shareholders."
BARACK’S ANTI-BP BARK EXAGGERATED All three network White House correspondents traveled to Louisiana with Barack Obama. All three ran a Presidential soundbite in which he appeared to bash BP for its $50m ad campaign--in which CEO Tony Hayward apologizes to the Gulf Coast for ruining their lives--and for its corporate commitment to continue paying dividends to shareholders. "The President tore into the oil company," was how NBC's Savannah Guthrie heard it. "The President seemed irritated," to ABC's Jake Tapper. "The President lashed out at BP," according to CBS' Chip Reid.
All three seemed to overlook the Obama modifier: "I do not want to hear"--when BP spends its money on public relations and investor dividends--"that they are nickel-and-diming fishermen or small businesses here." In other words, if BP spends its money in both areas simultaneously, that is fine by him.
CBS' Reid picked up on an interesting angle about Obama's six-month moratorium on deepwater oil exploration, pending an investigation into this disaster: the Times Picayune of New Orleans opposes such a precaution because of its impact on oil services employment. ABC's Tapper reported on censorship along the oil-slicked beaches: "Both government employees and private contractors have been told not to talk to the media or public about their activities--or risk being fired."
DON’T THINK TWICE NBC anchor Brian Williams, who filed from Louisiana for Nightly News on Tuesday and Wednesday, also reported for his network's primetime Dateline while on the Gulf Coast. He offered a preview of his reconstruction of the explosion on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig that was the first act of this disaster. He talked to the crew of the Damon B Bankston, the oil rig supply ship that rescued 115 of the 126 from the fire. "What do you think it takes to jump from a 70ft deck into water with oil and fire in it?" Williams wondered. "If you are in that situation I do not think you think twice," came the answer.
SUMMERTIME BLUES There was one other story, besides the ongoing pollution of the Gulf of Mexico, that was newsworthy enough to warrant coverage by a correspondent from all three newscasts. May's unemployment data were released by the Department of Labor. ABC's David Muir and NBC's John Yang both went through the numbers: a 9.7% jobless rate; 15m out of work nationwide; almost all new hiring accounted for by temporary Census Bureau work. CBS' Anthony Mason looked at the hardest hit demographic: the tight job market means a 26% unemployment rate for teenagers looking for a summer job.
THE BRIDE WORE BLACK The Pew Research Center picked up publicity from ABC's Linsey Davis for its crunching of Census Bureau data to coincide with the June wedding season. Pew found that one knot out of every six nowadays is tied by a biracial couple, "which makes us one of the most colorblind countries when it comes to saying I Do, second only to Brazil." Davis picked up on one nugget that has the nickname The Black Girl Curse: while 22% of today's African-American grooms marry outside their race, only 9% of African-American brides do.
UNELECTABLE WITHOUT ELECTABILITY Dean Reynolds checked in with the Tea Party for CBS, the first update on the conservative populist movement since its Tax Day protests six weeks ago. Reynolds pointed to midterm contests in November in which Tea Party candidates may run on the Republican line in Nevada, Florida, Utah, Arizona and Kentucky. "Republicans know that passion and energy are terrific but they also know that without electability you do not win elections," Reynolds opined tautologically. His example was Tony d'Annunzio, a machine-gun-loving Tea Party candidate for the Republican nomination in North Carolina's 8th CD: "Divorce papers called him a messianic drug user who worries that a gigantic pyramid will des end on Greenland."
Friday's lead story from Louisiana for both CBS and ABC did not concern damage to human beings at all. We saw both ABC's Matt Gutman and CBS' Mark Strassmann on their cellphones to BP's hotline to notify them of the GPS location of oil-slimed brown pelicans. Gutman described "feathers basted in oil the consistency of molasses." Strassmann reported back to his anchor Katie Couric: "It looked terrible, pathetic." On NBC, Kerry Sanders detailed the broader consequences for wildlife, pointing out that slimed marshland is a stopover for millions of migrating birds. Franz Joseph Land (in the Barents Sea) will suffer, he warned, as its tundra will be bereft of sanderlings, red knots and terns, all slimed in Louisiana's "goopy ooze" instead.
SUNTAN OIL In normal circumstances, the pristine beaches of Pensacola in the first week of June would have been a dream assignment for a correspondent. Of course, assignments are rarely made when things are dreamy. So Florida-based reporters Mark Potter of NBC and Kelly Cobiella of CBS went beachcombing for tar balls along with Good Morning America weathercaster Sam Champion for ABC: "It is a $60bn tourism industry here in Florida," Campion reckoned. "People come to Pensacola for the sun, the waves and the white sandy beaches but this morning they got something else…oily globs."
BP FACES BILLIONS IN FINES NBC decided to lead with the seadbed video of BP's robot submarines attaching a containment cap to siphon off crude from the leaking pipe to a surface ship. Anne Thompson got technical with us, explaining how warm water and methanol were being pumped down to prevent hydrate crystals from forming in the frigid deep sea water. Such crystals would clog the siphon, forcing the oil to continue to gush outwards. Only after the pipe is crystal free would vents, through which crude continues to escape, be closed and the surfacebound volume increase.
Sharyl Attkisson, in CBS' Washington bureau, offered her insight into why BP would have an interest in minimizing the volume of the leak. The corporation faces a fine of $4,300 for each day for each barrel that leaks. Last week, Attkisson reported, the Department of the Interior published a BP estimate that the volume of the leak was between 12K and 19K barrels each day, a $2bn fine so far. "Spinning the numbers," was how Attkisson put it. It turns out that those figures were BP's estimates for the minimum size of the leak: "The upper end of the range, a maximum, has not yet been released."
Speaking of BP's underestimate of the scope of the calamity, NBC's Thompson reminded us that CEO Tony Hayward had claimed that there was "no scientific evidence" that gigantic plumes of crude oil were forming in Gulf of Mexico waters. She quoted a University of South Florida finding that corrected the CEO: "Lab tests confirm the existence of two massive layers of oil droplets far beneath the surface of the sea."
ABC's Bill Weir filed a brief profile of CEO Hayward, the triathlon running, soccer supporting, downhill skiing, global yachtsman with a $4.5m annual salary. Weir dug up a self-incriminatory Hayward soundbite from a Stanford University seminar last summer in which he boasted that he had scaled back BP's commitment to environmental sustainability: "We had too many people that were working to save the world. We, sort of, lost track of the fact that our primary purpose in life is to create value for our shareholders."
BARACK’S ANTI-BP BARK EXAGGERATED All three network White House correspondents traveled to Louisiana with Barack Obama. All three ran a Presidential soundbite in which he appeared to bash BP for its $50m ad campaign--in which CEO Tony Hayward apologizes to the Gulf Coast for ruining their lives--and for its corporate commitment to continue paying dividends to shareholders. "The President tore into the oil company," was how NBC's Savannah Guthrie heard it. "The President seemed irritated," to ABC's Jake Tapper. "The President lashed out at BP," according to CBS' Chip Reid.
All three seemed to overlook the Obama modifier: "I do not want to hear"--when BP spends its money on public relations and investor dividends--"that they are nickel-and-diming fishermen or small businesses here." In other words, if BP spends its money in both areas simultaneously, that is fine by him.
CBS' Reid picked up on an interesting angle about Obama's six-month moratorium on deepwater oil exploration, pending an investigation into this disaster: the Times Picayune of New Orleans opposes such a precaution because of its impact on oil services employment. ABC's Tapper reported on censorship along the oil-slicked beaches: "Both government employees and private contractors have been told not to talk to the media or public about their activities--or risk being fired."
DON’T THINK TWICE NBC anchor Brian Williams, who filed from Louisiana for Nightly News on Tuesday and Wednesday, also reported for his network's primetime Dateline while on the Gulf Coast. He offered a preview of his reconstruction of the explosion on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig that was the first act of this disaster. He talked to the crew of the Damon B Bankston, the oil rig supply ship that rescued 115 of the 126 from the fire. "What do you think it takes to jump from a 70ft deck into water with oil and fire in it?" Williams wondered. "If you are in that situation I do not think you think twice," came the answer.
SUMMERTIME BLUES There was one other story, besides the ongoing pollution of the Gulf of Mexico, that was newsworthy enough to warrant coverage by a correspondent from all three newscasts. May's unemployment data were released by the Department of Labor. ABC's David Muir and NBC's John Yang both went through the numbers: a 9.7% jobless rate; 15m out of work nationwide; almost all new hiring accounted for by temporary Census Bureau work. CBS' Anthony Mason looked at the hardest hit demographic: the tight job market means a 26% unemployment rate for teenagers looking for a summer job.
THE BRIDE WORE BLACK The Pew Research Center picked up publicity from ABC's Linsey Davis for its crunching of Census Bureau data to coincide with the June wedding season. Pew found that one knot out of every six nowadays is tied by a biracial couple, "which makes us one of the most colorblind countries when it comes to saying I Do, second only to Brazil." Davis picked up on one nugget that has the nickname The Black Girl Curse: while 22% of today's African-American grooms marry outside their race, only 9% of African-American brides do.
UNELECTABLE WITHOUT ELECTABILITY Dean Reynolds checked in with the Tea Party for CBS, the first update on the conservative populist movement since its Tax Day protests six weeks ago. Reynolds pointed to midterm contests in November in which Tea Party candidates may run on the Republican line in Nevada, Florida, Utah, Arizona and Kentucky. "Republicans know that passion and energy are terrific but they also know that without electability you do not win elections," Reynolds opined tautologically. His example was Tony d'Annunzio, a machine-gun-loving Tea Party candidate for the Republican nomination in North Carolina's 8th CD: "Divorce papers called him a messianic drug user who worries that a gigantic pyramid will des end on Greenland."
