Open Letter to the ABC

Dear ABC (Australia) News:

I understand that the recent tornado that touched down in and around Moore, Oklahoma is a big news story.  I do not deny that.  And I appreciate the coverage you are giving the tragedy.  But, please, please, please educate and reign in your reporters/interviewers.

The interviews have only served to highlight the overall ignorance of tornado systems at the ABC.  Australia does not experience this kind of storm system, and certainly not in the numbers and intensity the areas of the United States known as "Tornado Alley."  The reporters/interviewers obviously have no idea of the destruction left in the wake of an EF5 tornado.  They have no personal frame of reference and apparently cannot even act as if they do.

Specifically, the interview aired on ABC 24 around 10:30 am on May 23 was by far the worst and most painful segment I have seen.  The anchor was speaking with an Oklahoma City official and kept pressing the idea that legislation requiring safe rooms/storm shelters in all buildings would have prevented all the deaths as a result of this tornado system.  If only it were that easy.  By continuing to suggest that is the case, the reporter showed himself to be not only ignorant but also incapable of accepting the knowledge of a man who lives with the threat of this kind of storm system daily.

It would be lovely to be able to say that every one of the deaths as a result of the tornado would have been prevented if all homes and buildings were legally required to have storm shelters/safe rooms, but that is simply not the case.  Not only is it closing the barn doors after the horses have bolted, but it is not true.  There was at most 15 minutes of warning the storm was approaching.  I'll repeat that.  The residents of Moore, Oklahoma had no more than fifteen minutes to hear the sirens and get to shelter.  In some areas it was actually less than 10 minutes, and closer to 5 minutes.  Even if shelter had been available in every structure, many simply could not make it to those shelter in that amount of time.  A number of the dead were not in buildings at all, they were on vehicles or in open fields.  There was simply not time to get to the safe rooms that were available.  It served no purpose to try to force legislation on a man who is trying to deal with a mass tragedy, the likes of which most of the ABC news staff have never seen and have no real understanding.  Legislation such as the anchor repeatedly suggested would not have prevented all the deaths.  Spending the majority of the interview trying to get him to agree that it would have is counterproductive and a waste of everyone's time, but particularly the man who has a true disaster to manage.

I really expected better from the reporters/anchors/interviewers on the ABC.  I would have expected them to have been briefed better, to have actually researched the topic with more than a Google search and a skim of a Wikipedia article.  True journalists actually do research and try to become at least minimally knowledgeable of their subject before tackling interviews.  I really expected the level of craft to be higher at an institution as respected as the ABC.

I truly appreciate the extensive coverage of events from my home country.   I would prefer that the coverage be informative, of more than just the ignorance of the reporters.

Thank You,
a frustrated ABC 24 viewer