PHOTOS, PAGE 1

       Editor and prime reporter is Doug Terry, a veteran television and radio reporter in   Washington, DC, (details below)

If you have paid attention to news reports over this weekend, you’ve gotten an incorrect picture of the situation in Chile. The reports can be summed up this way: really bad earthquake in Chile, quite a few deaths, lots of damage, no tsunami damage in Hawaii or Japan.

Here’s the deal: the tsunami hit Chile, not Hawaii. There could be two thousand or more dead along the southern coast of Chile considerable distance away from Santiago. The few scenes of damage that have been brought out look a lot like the Asian tsunami of ‘04: near total devastation in the low lying, coastal villages and towns. Here is a clip from a NY Times report:

 In Cobquecura, 50 miles north of Concepcion, state television showed collapsed bridges, crashed buses and sunken pavement. Residents had fled to the hills, prompting local journalists to declare it a virtual ghost town.

 In remote coastal towns, strong waves had obliterated homes, and boats were found on land next to overturned cars. The authorities acknowledged that the damage was spread over such a vast area that they were just beginning to get a handle on it.

The basic problem with the American media is this: one of the unwritten rules of journalism is you don’t go on the air or into print and say “We just don’t know”. You think you know, you want to know, so you report what is available, even if that presents an incorrect picture.

By the time of the evening national newscasts tomorrow (Monday), perhaps the American media will figure out that the big story of this earthquake is the tsunami and report the story that way. That seems likely to happen, unless other news comes along and bumps this story out of the top position, in which the false impression will be allowed to rest in most minds.

Doug Terry, 2.28.10 9:49 PM (eastern)

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