Columbia mall shooting story offers revealing look at local, cable TV news

[mfcorey1]

By David Zurawik The Baltimore Sun
6:27 p.m. EST, January 25, 2014
All the TV stations in Baltimore say they’re the ones to turn to for breaking news.

Coverage of a shooting Saturday morning at the Mall in Columbia that left three dead put those promises to the test in a major way. Not everyone passed.

The local stations that got there first with the most resources were WJZ (Channel 13) and WBAL (Channel 11), which were on the air shortly after 12:30 p.m.

WMAR-TV was on-air with live coverage shortly after 1 p.m, but WBFF (Channel 45) didn’t offer viewers anything except syndicated programming, infomercials and auto racing until 2:30 p.m. And then, it provided only 30 minutes of coverage before returning to Fox network NASCAR coverage.

“We focused on social media until official comments came out from Howard County Police,” Bill Fanshawe, general manager of WBFF, said in an email to The Sun when asked why his station covered the story as it did.

But Howard County Police had conducted a news conference in the mall parking lot almost an hour before WBFF started its TV coverage. WBAL, WJZ and WMAR all carried it live starting about 1:30 p.m.

Some of the most impressive hustle came from CNN. Mike Ahlers, a senior producer from its Washington bureau, was on air shortly after 12:30 p.m., talking via phone over a mall image that he sent as soon as he arrived in Columbia. CNN correspondent Erin McPike was at the mall by 12:40 p.m.

WJZ was ahead of WBAL on Twitter Saturday morning, but at the start of live TV coverage, WBAL had the edge in images, thanks to having its own helicopter over the mall parking lot.

It also had multiple reporters from both the Hearst-owned radio and TV stations on the ground. Scott Wycoff, from WBAL radio, was there and filing reports by noon, and Jayne Miller and producer Shannon Encina arrived a short time later. (Encina is married to Sun sports reporter Eduardo A. Encina.) WBAL-TV’s initial coverage featured audio from Wycoff with maps and still images of the mall until the helicopter got in position and started transmitting live imagery.

WJZ used maps and still photographs over audio until about 1:05 p.m., when it joined a feed from a helicopter that was also providing images to WMAR during the afternoon. The pictures were grainier and more static. But they were good enough given the situation.

WJZ confirmed that it did not get its own helicopter over the mall until 2:15 p.m. But like WBAL, it had a strong presence on the ground at the mall and the in the studio all afternoon.

WBAL did come in for some criticism on social media, with one tweet criticizing an image purported to be that of the store where the shooting took place: “@wbaltv11 You keep showing the storefront of a Zumiez that is 100% not the Zumiez in Columbia. Really bad journalism. Come on now.”

“Zumiez picture is from Google maps …with the address that is correlated to the Columbia Mall,” Dan Joerres, WBAL-TV’s general manager, wrote in an email response to a Sun question about the image and the tweet.
Citing sources, NBC News, CNN and WBAL radio and TV reported the shooting as a "domestic" situation, though all also quoted Howard County Police Chief William J. McMahon saying that officials could not confirm any motive. Responding to an inquiry from The Sun about those reports, WBAL-TV news director Michelle Butt wrote that her station was basing its report on multiple sources.


Read more: http://www.baltimoresun.com/entertainment/tv/z-on-tv-blog/bal-columbia-mall-shooting-tv-cable-news-coverage-20140125,0,3207740.story#ixzz2rUr8qcXy

[seveneyes]

1. Dirty Laundry

Sensationalized news might be just what a sicko needs to go and shoot up a public place. Perhaps instead of all the drama, news stations could focus just on the facts.

[clffrdjk]

2. Exactly

The real question is who had the most accurate story. I don't care which one gets their first.

[Paladin]

3. You're a Gun Control/RKBA Group fan, and you favor FOX's non-reporting of this gun violence.

Suspicions confirmed.

[clffrdjk]

4. Am I a gun guy yep

Does that make my above post wrong? That's awfully progressive of you.

As for the fox thing just where the hell are you getting that?

[Paladin]

5. WBFF Channel 45, in the article.

And spare me any opinions about what's "progressive," OK?

[clffrdjk]

6. I did not know that was a fox station sorry.

But let's be honest here you have some sort of issue with me, you couldn't possibly take issue with my initial post in this thread. I mean only an idiot would argue that speed is more important than accuracy. So why attack me? Oh my opinion on other issues is different from yours, yea I must be evil and you must fight the evil on every front.

How far off am I?

[Paladin]

7. My issue is with efforts to minimize reporting of shooting incidents.

It's a small movement that has appeared in DU recently, on forums and groups other than Gun Control/RKBA (where griping about the media is an old practice). The argument is that, since mentally-unbalanced individuals may be moved to copy-cat actions due to news coverage of shooting incidents, such reporting should be curtailed, if not completely eliminated. My response to that is: What other news stories should be off-limits on that same basis? Rape? Child kidnapping? It's a genuinely unhealthy attitude, as far as I'm concerned.

[clffrdjk]

11. Well then go find someone who agrees with censorship.

Because I sure as hell don't.

And that was no where near related to my post or how you responded to it

[ChisolmTrailDem]

8. They all suck. All of them. nt

[Ron Green]

9. I wonder which of those local stations

ever runs stories examining the causes of the toxic nature of our culture. That would be TV worth watching.

[Lurks Often]

10. The media is now more interested in being first, then being accurate

and are perfectly content to broadcast wild, unsubstantiated theories without any facts, as long as it keeps the public tuned to their channel. Ratings trump facts and accuracy.

Based on past incidents, it will be 5-10 days before a realistic reporting of what happened can be expected.