Airplane!

Townhall.com ^ | July 8, 2013 | Neal Boortz

[Kaslin]

OK … I’ll admit it. I did get a little testy on Twitter (@Talkmaster) Saturday afternoon while watching coverage of the crash landing of that Asiana 777 in San Francisco. There’s an explanation.

My first hint at a problem at SFO was a video a follower sent me of the smoke from the burning aircraft. I immediately went to the usual sites on the Internet and TV to see what was going on. Nothing. Nobody had a clue. Twitter beat out the big boys.

Eventually, though, the coverage started to break on CNN and Fox News. I chose Fox. This was the only way I could be assured that Piers Morgan wasn’t going to be part of the coverage. Right off the bat it became clear that Fox was relying on reports from people who barely new the difference between a DC7 and a 777. The errors and impossibilities in the reporting were laughable, so I switched to CNN. Not much better there … and loyalties are loyalties … so it was back to Fox.

We need Fox News. Oh, I know Fox drives the proggies nuts. They’re so used to having a lock on the principal news outlets that they can scarcely believe there are people out there reporting from a different perspective. Without Fox News we never would have known of Obama’s failed gun running program Fast & Furious. Fox News kept us in the loop on Benghazi. While other networks, broadcast and cable, were telling us the story on the IRS scandal was pretty much over, Fox was still revealing new angles; including the fact that the orders to drop the IRS hammer on conservative organizations came from the Obama junta.

I’m persona non grata on Fox these days. Maybe it was that sports coat I wore on Cavuto. Perhaps they think I was the one who goaded Beckel into dropping that F-bomb. Maybe they didn’t appreciate me telling folks that although Shep Smith is an incredible anchor, he really is quite a jerk in person. Who knows? I’m retired, and I’m fine with it. The makeup made my face break out anyway. But I still watch Fox News (right up until Hubcap O’Reilly at 8:00) and I revel in the way they clobber CNN and annihilate MSNBC in the ratings.

So here’s the problem. Fox News is attacked constantly by the left because they dare to report what the leftist media won’t. To repel these attacks, Fox News has to work harder than most to retain its reputation for accuracy in news reporting. People who hear absurdities solemnly presented in the coverage of a major aviation story are very likely to lose confidence in the political side of Fox reporting as well.

Just what mistakes did various Fox reporters make this weekend? Well here’s a few:

• “The plane skidded on its back down the runway.” That gem was repeated for fully five hours after the accident and after half the free world saw the plane sitting upright in the dirt next to runway 28L.
• "We don't know if there were one or two pilots. Presumably there were at least two." You don’t know? There are ALWAYS at least two pilots on a commercial flight. This time there were four.
• “The plane overshot the runway.” Heard this several times. Tell me … if you overshoot a runway how do you manage to leave a debris field at the very beginning of the runway? Look up “undershot.”
• “The plane cartwheeled down the runway.” Though it did lift in the air at one point before it slammed back down, the plane actually spun down the runway. It did not turn cartwheels.
• Explaining video of one of the jet engines: “That’s the engine. That’s what makes it go.” Really? Now to be fair, don’t remember if I saw that one on CNN or Fox.
• Now here’s one I didn’t hear myself, but got it from multiple Twitter followers. One reporter said that the problem might have been caused by the plane landing into the wind. Uh huh. Airplanes always land into the wind, Sherlock. Also heard that one reporter said that the airplane “landed first, then crashed.”
• I truly thought that if kept listening I would soon hear someone say that the accident was either caused by global warming, George Bush, or the fact that gravity is always stronger over water than it is over land.
• This wasn’t a part of this particular incident, but I am reminded of an accident in Atlanta. A small plane encountered a sinkhole while taxiing to the runway for takeoff. A wheel went into the pothole and the prop struck the ground. The local news anchor said “the plane crashed on takeoff.”

Part of my angst here is surely due to my own personal interest in aviation. I studied aerospace engineering. I’ve been a pilot for about 35 years. I’ve heard liberals like Obama demonize the evil “rich” people who own and fly their own private aircraft, even though the average value of a single-engine piston airplane flying today is less than the cost of a new bass rig.

Aviation and the flying public are poorly served by people who know nothing about the subject engaging in wild and mindless speculation when an incident happens. Fox, CNN and the rest of the broadcast media can, and should, do better.

[miss marmelstein]

While this is a very sad story, why has it pushed the Egyptian craziness off the news? Because it makes Kerry & Obama look incompetent again?

[ConservativeStatement]

I was out much of the day and Fox was at a commercial break so I tuned into MSNBC. I heard Greta on Fox praise lawyers for making planes safe. Some of the reporting was a joke as I switched to the different channels. I did hear one reporter on the scene say “The plane is literally in pieces.” “Literally”? The only thing missing was a “Like, ohmygod.”

[oldtimer]

AIRSPEED RUNWAY AIRSPEED RUNWAY are the fundamentals of landing an airplane .

[txrefugee]

The report on CNN was about 15 minutes after Fox announced it. The social media was first, of course, with passengers who had fled the plane tweeting almost immediately. The new media is first.

[Kaslin]

It was reported on Fox and Friends this morning that the pilot had only 43 hours flying time on the particular airplane and had never flown into San Francisco with the air plane. The question is why did the chief pilot allow him to fly it.

[Kaslin]

Speaking of Kerry. Fox and Friends reported this morning that he suffered a seizure

[Vendome]

Whatever ...

[GladesGuru]

“Speaking of Kerry. Fox and Friends reported this morning that he suffered a seizure”

How can anyone know?

[TomGuy]

The ‘new media’ had photos and video uploaded within the first 8 minutes.

None of the big news outlets even had reporters dispatched by then. And they had to rely on the ‘weekend’ crews who tend to be fill-ins.

==

Hardly a crisis has ever gone by that some newsies didn’t say something completely stupid or ridiculous. In such crises, they have to make up commentaries, sometimes for hours.

They can be painful to watch or listen to.

[Texas Eagle]

The last place I go for news is the media.

I still remember FOX's coverage of the Gabby Gifford's shooting.

They "confirmed" her death at least twice.

And minutes after the terrible tornado in Oklahoma a few weeks ago, they "confirmed" 150 dead with the dead toll "expected to go much higher".

The next day, 150 had become 22 or some such number. Still tragic.

I wonder how Obama's Press Corpse defines the word "confirmed".

[TomGuy]

Re: Kerry

Not HE, but SHE. It was his wife who was taken to the hospital.

[miss marmelstein]

It was his wife.

[reg45]

Aircraft accidents involving commercial airliners are comparitively rare. I can understand why the news organizations don’t have a thorough knowledge of aeronautical engineering. Remember, these are Communications or J School graduates not engineering graduates.

[Wally_Kalbacken]

Amen, brother Boortz! This was exactly my experience on Saturday, listening with disbelief to the inaccuracies and stupidities that were repeated in the first few hours. Granted it was a Saturday afternoon on a a holiday weekend, and even the “B Team” was at home. FNC in particular has to get on the stick. They have a ratings advantage, now do something with it and up your game of actual journalism!

[cripplecreek]

I watch the BBC world news in the mornings. In two hours I can get more global news than I’ll get watching all the American cable channels all day.

One problem I see with our cable news these days is that its all about headhunting and finding who to punish. I don’t think Obama was even mentioned in the BBC coverage of Egypt because it was unimportant in a story about the facts on the ground. They also managed to give at least 10 minutes of coverage to both the SFO Plane crash and the Quebec train derailment. They also gave a few minutes to the small plane that crashed in Alaska and a few minutes to a big bribery case in China.

The BBC is pretty biased but straight news is straight news.

[JohnnyP]

I heard his wife was in the hospital. Perhaps it was that suffered the seizure?

[ALPAPilot]

Every time I hear the mainstream media report on a subject that I have considerable knowledge about, they always demonstrate their stupidity. As a 777 pilot, this is no exception.

I no longer believe any of them.

[Kenny Bunk]

Too simple. Plane stopped flying short of the runway and "tripped" over the seawall. Goin' too slow too low. Could happen. Maybe put the gear down late and that rubbed off too much speed at an altitude where he couldn't put the nose down. Captain was a an F-5 hotshot, then an F-4 hotshot. Plenty of experience in 747, etc. Bad mistake. Too many pilots on board. Distracting.

The two dead kids were run over by the first responders? Could happen. Can you spell "lawsuit?"

Never could figure out why they never "ramp" the seaward side on these seawalls a bit, so "low and slow" might have a shot at sliding over. This happens a bit more than it should. LAG in NY is kinda notorious for it.

[Vendome]

Kerry?