Just a quick observation regarding Hurricane Irene hitting the Northeast this morning and the media-at-large. Normally when there is a tropical storm bearing down on central Florida you'll see a little 15 to 30 second blurb from the national media outlets. They smile, maybe crack a cheesy storm-related joke, then cut to commercial. Zero, none, not one iota of concern in their eyes
This morning however, I saw something completely different when I turned on the TV at work...Good Morning America, in a rare Sunday morning broadcast. Gone were the corny jokes and friendly smiles, replaced with real fear in their eyes and anxiety in their voices. Hardly the cool, calm, and collected demeanor that one would expect from such a long-running and well-choreographed "news source".
To listen to the majority of major media outlets you'd think Armageddon was upon them...call it "9/11: Part II" if you will. How easily they forget / overlook that we in the Southern states, from North Carolina to Texas, face these types of storms every single year. I still recall 2004 when the eye of no less than three hurricanes crossed over my house, one of which was a category four hurricane. Hell, it was like they forgot 2005's Hurricane Katrina altogether, dubbing lil' miss Irene with the less-than-deserved monicker of "storm of the century". Then again, "storm of the decade thus far" just isn't a real sound bite attention getter.
Now, this isn't to say that a category one hurricane (now a tropical storm) is any less dangerous than a full-blown Cat-5, nor should it be taken lightly....far from it in fact. Some times you just gotta ignore the media hype and change the channel. Better still, just turn the damned thing off...and turn on the less-than-riveting NOAA weather radio.
In other storm-related news, I'll be taking out the stick (that's a surf board for you land-locked folks) for the second day in a row. It ain't very often you see 8 to10 foot waves on the Atlantic coast of Florida...gotta take advantage of'em while they last.
This morning however, I saw something completely different when I turned on the TV at work...Good Morning America, in a rare Sunday morning broadcast. Gone were the corny jokes and friendly smiles, replaced with real fear in their eyes and anxiety in their voices. Hardly the cool, calm, and collected demeanor that one would expect from such a long-running and well-choreographed "news source".
To listen to the majority of major media outlets you'd think Armageddon was upon them...call it "9/11: Part II" if you will. How easily they forget / overlook that we in the Southern states, from North Carolina to Texas, face these types of storms every single year. I still recall 2004 when the eye of no less than three hurricanes crossed over my house, one of which was a category four hurricane. Hell, it was like they forgot 2005's Hurricane Katrina altogether, dubbing lil' miss Irene with the less-than-deserved monicker of "storm of the century". Then again, "storm of the decade thus far" just isn't a real sound bite attention getter.
Now, this isn't to say that a category one hurricane (now a tropical storm) is any less dangerous than a full-blown Cat-5, nor should it be taken lightly....far from it in fact. Some times you just gotta ignore the media hype and change the channel. Better still, just turn the damned thing off...and turn on the less-than-riveting NOAA weather radio.
In other storm-related news, I'll be taking out the stick (that's a surf board for you land-locked folks) for the second day in a row. It ain't very often you see 8 to10 foot waves on the Atlantic coast of Florida...gotta take advantage of'em while they last.
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