Bay Area Earthquake
Like most people tonight, I was huddled in my most comfy chair watching the tube when the earthquake hit.
It was just a swell coming up through the chair, shimmying the house and getting the dining room light fixture swinging. My husband and I, both California natives, looked at each other without even a flinch.
“Earthquake,” he says.
Maybe I should check the news.
All but KRON-Channel 4 made do with a quick on-air recognition that, indeed, an earthquake had just happened. KRON stayed on the air, although you might wonder why when all the station did was repeat the information we had already: 5.6, centered in Alum Rock.
Seriously, how many people do you want to hear telling about how they were sitting there and then…well, you read the top of this so you know what everyone said.
If you popped over to the Web sites, you got more information. Well, not from KRON-Channel 4, but I’ve got to applaud both KPIX-Channel 5 and KGO-Channel 7 for their preparedness. They had maps, reports, guides to weathering an earthquake and then they even had a video you could watch of the station breaking the story on air.
Sure, Ken Bastida thought Tony Russomano was Len Ramirez at first, but it was a minor bobble. And I could never get the live Web cam to work. But I scored this Web site as the easiest to use.
Over at KGO, we clicked on Dan Ashley breaking the news. While Ken stayed on for almost eight minutes, Dan made do with about 2.35.
KTVU-Channel 2, which has a really cluttered Web page that isn’t easily navigated under the best of circumstances, had an AP story but no video posted at first. Later, there was a video with Julie Haener. But you had to sit through a stupid car commerical with some guy getting a tattoo removed before you could watch it.
San Jose-based KNTV-Channel 11, where the quake was centered, lacked the breaking news video on the page. Even worse, they had a video from an earlier quake that confused me until I realized they were talking about ANOTHER earthquake.
Sure, this was just a moderate earthquake, but in the case of a real earthquake, we’d like to know the best place to go on the Web for info.
Cole said,
October 31, 2007 at 2:39 am
Actually, in a real emergency, you should listen to an EAS primary station (KCBS 740 AM)
RG said,
October 31, 2007 at 7:54 am
I was upset that KTVU kept breaking away from House and Bones to relay the same message over and over again. Wait until the commercial, I say, and stop updating until you have more information.
RG
Teresa Conti said,
October 31, 2007 at 12:51 pm
I enjoyed channel 4’s coverage, although I was surprised none of the other stations had anything live about it for very long. I enjoyed the CA callers (the earth shook a little) and the visitor callers (OMG the earth actually SHOOK). I enjoyed the pictures from the viewers of the quake areas. I am glad they stuck with it for a while, because folks who didn’t have a radio or computer, had a place to go for info. Thanks, Ch 4.