November 1999, Vol. 10, No. 11
Getting religion
Hurricanes ’99 show why newspapers need to prepare for disaster
Eye of the storm: Hurricane Floyd, as seen from the Goes weather satellite on Sept. 15, 1999, lurks over the Carolinas and Florida.
Image: National Oceanic
and Atmospheric Administration/
Department of Commerce
In recent weeks the local papers and TV stations here in Northern California have saluted the 10-year anniversary of the Loma Preita earthquake that shook the ground -- and shook up the local papers and TV stations.
Interestingly, none of them discussed how they covered the Oct. 17, 1989, disaster -- and none suggested they were prepared for the next Big One.
At the same time, on another coast, the local papers were a little too busy to worry about 10-year anniversaries of disasters -- they had a set of disasters of their own.
Hurricanes Floyd and Irene invaded the southeastern United States earlier this fall, hitting the communities -- and their newspapers -- pretty hard.
Some of those papers had extensive disaster plans, though, and were able to use them effectively; others had to improvise.
Inside, Correspondent Steven E. Brier visits with the editors and executives of papers throughout the region to determine how they reacted to the hurricanes and how they continued to publish during the disasters.
Brier’s research shows that the papers which reacted to these two hurricanes best were the papers which had planned in advance.
As we pointed out in the very first issue of The Cole Papers -- published 10 years ago next month -- disasters come in all sizes.
For one newspaper, a disaster can be the crashing of a computer front-end system; for another, the loss of electricity throughout the region. For some, it takes a full-blown hurricane to define disaster; for others, the late arrival of one specific worker.
Regardless, most newspapers are not prepared to handle a disaster larger than a hang-nail on the copy desk chief. It is heartening that the papers in the southeast have developed and maintained disaster coverage plans designed to compensate for most every contingency.
¶
"Over the transom," is a term familiar to most editors -- it’s when a story arrives unbeckoned and yet welcome. Such is the case for Peter G. Marsh’s piece on the Windscale Principle, which is inside.
Marsh, an executive with Atex Media Solutions Inc. of Bedford, Mass., has spent many years in the newspaper systems business, and has a degree in journalism. He’s watched many systems being purchased and installed quite a few as well.
Marsh’s theories on the difference between a request for proposal and a specification are quite refreshing. Over the last decade, my own theories about how to buy systems have evolved and Marsh has crystallized much of my recent thinking.
Also inside, Correspondent Jay Small takes a look at the current state of "shovelware" -- that much-derided piece of computer software that moves the text of the printed newspaper over to the new media side of the house. Small, the new media editor of the Indianapolis Star, reviews the procedures and technologies used by big newspapers and not-so-big papers in a revealing article.
Correspondent L. Carol Christopher helps us get a handle on what’s happening in the world of TV schedule listings and TV books in light of the recent acquisition of TV Guide and the compelling nature of TV listings channels on cable systems.
And, we wrap up in Hellbox with stories about the Associated Press ending its phototechnology marketing group and Quark Inc. transferring the development and support responsibilities for its Quark Publishing System to a third-party company.
We hope today -- much as we did almost 10 years ago -- that our coverage of the hurricanes of 1999 will persuade you to develop a disaster contingency plan of your own, that you will get religion.
-- David M. Cole
From THE COLE PAPERS, November 1999, Copyright © 1999, All Rights Reserved.