Killer Tsunami! Death toll now up to 150,000

[quote name='Admiral Ackbar']If I may say, more people may watch Fox, but they're frankly fools. Of all the media channels, only CNN is giving this decent coverage. Every time I turn on CNN they have new information, new innterviews, on the scene pictures, and the latest video.

I just turned on MSNBC. They have some wack new age Guru discussing how to avoid Alzeihmers. On Fox news they're discussing Illegal Immigration.

One of the worse natural disasters in the history of mankind... Something that occurs once every five hundred years or so... Rivaled by Krakatoa, Cascadia, and the Little Ice Age of the 14th century. That dwarfs Hurricane Mitch or the Iranian Earthquake that occured just a year ago and killed 30,000. Something that could see 200,000 dead after when everything is through.

Yet CNN is the one that's breaking all the news. They just showed a new bit of amazing video. Of some guys taping from the second floor of their hotel in Thailand and the water rushing into that level through the windows.[/quote]


It certainly makes one wonder....what if this took place in California, or British Columbia, or London? 60,000 dead so far, and sadly probably many more to follow because of disease. I know the media wouldn't be talking about it with the apathy they are this disaster.


NYTIMES.com has some heart wrenching photos, I couldn't look at all of them, so many picures of parents mourning their children and they have to bury them so quickly. I ache for them as I can't even --no I don't want to even imagine their pain. I don't want to think about my two boys being lost..
 
...fox news has been covering this almost nonstop. There are other things that also have to be reported besides this though. I watched Fox News all day as they showed many different videos of the disaster. They interviewed several people who were actually in the disaster. They were constantly updating the death toll.
 
[quote name='Admiral Ackbar']If I may say, more people may watch Fox, but they're frankly fools. Of all the media channels, only CNN is giving this decent coverage. Every time I turn on CNN they have new information, new innterviews, on the scene pictures, and the latest video.

I just turned on MSNBC. They have some wack new age Guru discussing how to avoid Alzeihmers. On Fox news they're discussing Illegal Immigration.

One of the worse natural disasters in the history of mankind... Something that occurs once every five hundred years or so... Rivaled by Krakatoa, Cascadia, and the Little Ice Age of the 14th century. That dwarfs Hurricane Mitch or the Iranian Earthquake that occured just a year ago and killed 30,000. Something that could see 200,000 dead after when everything is through.

Yet CNN is the one that's breaking all the news. They just showed a new bit of amazing video. Of some guys taping from the second floor of their hotel in Thailand and the water rushing into that level through the windows.[/quote]

You can only repeat the same stuff so many times. I was watching Fox early this morning and the coverage was about 90% Tsunami and 10% everything else. When actual new stuff became available they ran it. The rest of the world doesn't go away just because bad stuff is happening in one place with those covering it helpless to really add anything to what has already been said. Besides ghoulishly upping the tally, that is.

If it were a story still developing beyond the death toll, it might merit interupting scheduled programming but the rotation already allows them to make it clear in the crawl that no new developments are pending. It was different on 9/11 because it was all unfolding in front of the cameras from the moment of the first impact in one of the most connected cities on earth. Some of the news operations merely had to point their studio cameras out the window to keep a live view of the towers going out on the airwaves. Situations like that are rather rare and notably in that case was due to human intent to get maximum attention.

You could reverse the question and ask why CNN was so focused on this to the exclusion of all else when all they could do is show suffering.

Also, in terms of great disasters, many in the third world have gone relatively unknown to those on the opposite side of the globe. There was an earthquake in China in 1976 that killed a QUARTER MILLION people. I only know about it because it happened on my birthday and turned up in trivia lists for that date. This was before the era of dedicated news channels and much of the ENG technology that drives their operations. I was newly 12 years old that day but I cannot recall any major coverage. Of course, access to China was pretty limited back then, so it was hard to get much info to report other than it was extremely destructive and fatal.
http://history1900s.about.com/od/horribledisasters/a/tangshan.htm
 
[quote name='"Lootr2Core']

It certainly makes one wonder....what if this took place in California, or British Columbia, or London? 60,000 dead so far, and sadly probably many more to follow because of disease. I know the media wouldn't be talking about it with the apathy they are this disaster.

[/quote]

The location where this occurred is one of the primary reasons for the death toll. The nature of the landscape make the region especially vulnerable and the prevalent poverty removes the element of human intervention to reduce the severity of the results. Nearly all communities adjoining the Pacific Ocean, where tsunamis are a well recognized threat, have well established emergency operations and communications. If a tsunami generating event is detected near Japan or the North American west coast, the means is in place to very quickly start warning people to seek high ground. On top of that, our standards for building structures would also mean much lesser devastation to those unable to escape.

If you've ever heard the phrase 'poverty kills,' this a perfect example. It may seem like all our wealth goes into toys but some of those tax dollars somehow manage to find their way into infrastructure that makes a huge difference when the time comes. Consider how much we spend in California just on enforcing building codes. This is why our earthquake death tolls have been merely in the dozens compared to other places, even when they're by quakes of lesser magnitude than those that hit Northridge in '94 and San Francisco in 1989. This level of safety came at a price and makes the real estate more expensive (on top of the high value location) but it's worth it. It's one of the greatest reasons to be wealthy in a global sense, even if you aren't wealthy at a local level.
 
I understand you point, however is that supposed to make these deaths more palatable or something?

Its a bit of apples and oranges, if a thirty foot wall of water travelling at 500 mph hit manhattan island, there would be terrible devesatation. I don't think the constuction codes would help my family on Long Island.
 
Worst Natural Disasters In History:
http://www.nbc10.com/news/4030540/detail.html

China has had a lot catastrophic disasters in the last century:

1976 - China
A deadly earthquake of a magnitude 8.0 strikes Tianjin, China, on July 27, 1976. The official casualty figure issued by the Chinese government was 255,000 people.

1959 - China
In July 1959, massive floods in China kill at least 2 million people.

1938 and 1939 - China
Floods kill 1 million people in a two-year period in China.

1931 - China
The massive flooding of the Yangtze River in China in 1931 caused more than 3 million deaths from flooding and starvation.

1887 - China
In 1887, about 900,000 people died when the country's Yellow River burst its banks in the worst-ever recorded flooding.
 
[quote name='Lootr2Core']What is ENG technology?[/quote]

Electronic News Gathering.

The amount of audiovisual recording and transmitting equipment a single human can now lug around is stunning compared to past eras of TV broadcasting. The nature of what kind of stories receive widespread coverage, often within minutes of their occurrance has been radically changed by this. Stories that might never have reached beyond their immediate state or county now get national coverage, especially with 24 news channels that are desparate to have something new to say since the last hour.

Among the stories of the tsunami survivors are western tourists who managed to inform their families of their survival by text messaging on their cellphone when all of the local land lines were out of commission. A surviving cell tower with a battery backup made all the difference. It wouldn't have been that long ago that such a story would have been impossible. The store and forward network for the text message didn't exist and few years earlier the cell tower for just voice had yet to be built.

Among the resuers and aid workers one of the great priorities will be communications. Getting a network up and running again will make a huge difference in getting aid to where it's most needed rather than sending teams out in random direction and hoping they do some good.

I've had contact with this sort of thing through a sometimes employer who is very deeply involved in OES (Office of Emergency Services) operations here in California. If just a few of the major network centers get knocked down they can take they whole net with them. It was a rude awakening when there was a fire at One Wilshire in downtown LA a few years ago. 40% of the internet worldwide went down with it. One of the tools we use to keep OES connected is a portable satellite dish that lets us create broadband service anywhere with a clear shot at the southern sky. (The satellite orbits over the equator.)
www.locationconnect.com
www.tachyon.net
 
[quote name='Lootr2Core']I understand you point, however is that supposed to make these deaths more palatable or something?

Its a bit of apples and oranges, if a thirty foot wall of water travelling at 500 mph hit manhattan island, there would be terrible devesatation. I don't think the constuction codes would help my family on Long Island.[/quote]

You're missing the point. The affected areas are extremely vulnerable because they barely rise above the ocean's level. If you examine the history of these places you'll see that flooding is a perpetual problem. This was on a greater and more rapid scale but the landscape is a major contributing factor. It makes for great beaches but also leaves you at the mercy of the ocean's whims.

How would you generate such an event of the North American east coast in such a way that everyone would be caught unawares? The landscape is very different and would require an orders of magnitude larger displacement of water to generate a similar volume reaching inland any great distance. It would require something unseen in human history, like an asteroid strike in the Atlantic to achieve that effect. Who do you think is going to do the job of keeping an eye out for killer objects from outer space? The wealthy nations or the poor ones who cannot even manage to issue evacuation orders for a much more mundane disaster?

Natural disasters have laid waste to human habitations as long as there has been humans to suffer the effect. The one thing that has made a difference has been the progress of civilization. To perpetuate itself civilizations seek the ability to prepare and reat to disasters that are going to occur regardless of our desires.

The deaths are neither lesser or greater in importance based on where they occur. Failure to take a warning from those deaths against possible repeats of their cause is of still greater importance.
 
I get your point eporbis, but please, watch the video.

How might an event happen in North America you ask? Well An earthquake could happen in the gulf of mexico, and a tidal wave could hit Florida, Miss. and New Orleans (under sea level). While there hasn't been a history of earthquakes there before yet it could happen Since it hasn't occured much in the past there are no warning systems for Tsunamis in the Gulf of Mexico. I don't believe there are warning systems in the Atlantic either because of the 'odds' that it won't happen. Natural disasters can happen any where, and while preparation may be able to lessen some of the damage, surprises ALWAYS happen.
 
[quote name='Lootr2Core']http://jlgolson.blogspot.com/2004/12/tsunami-video.html

download the video (the first one) no construction codes would save one from that, when there is 20 feet of water above your head and it keeps coming and coming and coming. Terrifying.[/quote]

Actually, I'd say that video supports my point entirely. The structure held up quite well and provided a measure of safety for those inside. Other footage has shown before and after shots of villages that were largely swept away with little evidence there been several hundred residents just a brief while earlier. The structures were flimsy and offer no resistance against the deluge.

Another good example was the Kobe quake in 1995. This by sheer bad fortune managed to hit the area of Japan that had the greatest combination of older buildings, many pre-War, and population density. This was a formula for death and destruction. The same jolt in many other Japanese cities would been much less damaging due to their being mostly newer construction in a nation that is very earthquake conscious. Shit happens. Sometime there will be a big jolt out in the middle of the Pacific which cause a substantial water displacement but it goes unnoticed by all but seismologists and perhaps an unfortunate ship because it's no more than a ripple by the time it makes landfall. Other times you get events like this.
 
So what are you saying? Sucks to be them? Its easy to say shit happens as long as the shit is happening on someone else. I would hope that when your community was struck by an event like this you wouldn't be saying "well shit happens" or "If only we had built a stronger house to take on a tidal wave, or f5 tornado, or if we only didn't live in an earthquake zone". ALL I know is that there is a tremendeous amount of pain and suffering right now, people are in need and in need of aid. Parents are burying their children, children are burying their parents. I will try to do what I can. And if a terrible earthquake would befall you tomorrow, I would try to do what I could to help, and I would hurt with you. I would hope, that if my community was struck by catastrophe that you would do the same.
 
amdf804983.jpg


No man should feel this man's pain.
 
I think it was Fox news that reported the wave hit San Diego on Tuesday and raised the ocean level 8 inches. And the wave hit parts of mexico creating a wave about 8 ft high. It's nuts that the wave's effects could be felt as far as the north america.

I feel really bad for those people hit by this. The communities of the 10 countries seem to be rallying donations and the relief effort.
 
[quote name='Lootr2Core']So what are you saying? Sucks to be them? Its easy to say shit happens as long as the shit is happening on someone else. I would hope that when your community was struck by an event like this you wouldn't be saying "well shit happens" or "If only we had built a stronger house to take on a tidal wave, or f5 tornado, or if we only didn't live in an earthquake zone". ALL I know is that there is a tremendeous amount of pain and suffering right now, people are in need and in need of aid. Parents are burying their children, children are burying their parents. I will try to do what I can. And if a terrible earthquake would befall you tomorrow, I would try to do what I could to help, and I would hurt with you. I would hope, that if my community was struck by catastrophe that you would do the same.[/quote]

I'm saying don't borrow other people's misery. There is a point where it turns from sympathy to a kind of pervesion in that others enjoy riding a high of intense emotion at no real expense to themselves. You are trying to suggest it is a binary response: either overwhelming sadness or callous disregard. That simply isn't true. This is where our realtime data feed can become a bad thing, when it removes all sensory distance from an event but keeps us safely away from the real consequences. I'm saying you have to have some perspective and realize that continued watching of the newsfeed showing the same wailing survivors over and over isn't helping those people and might be hurting you by letting you turn another's disaster into a virtual thrill.

Consider the situation of those entering the scene to render aid. To a large extent theyt have to mute their emotional response in order to perform. Otherwise they could become paralyzed by emotional overload. They are at the other end of the spectrum from the news junkies watching from a position of comfort and safety but for those aid workers it is entirely practical.
 
I dunno. I'm a news junky and have been watching the news pretty much Non-stop. And CNN is giving this much better coverage than MSNBC or Fox IMO. I'm not saying those news organizations aren;t covering it. But it's obvious the difference.

Last night Fox was showing video that CNN had aired the day before. Both Fox News and MSNBC had the LA Times reporter call in last night and he had called into CNN the day before.

And China does have a long history of flooding. They just had massive flooding a few years ago that I think killed a hundred thousand people. The state wouldn't allow the news to cover it in their country, which seems like a crime. When a natural disaster happens there, because of the population density, hundreds of thousands get killed. How many millions have died in the past couple years from Famine in North Korea?It is not just the death tool that makes this signifigant. It has an unprecedented regional effect. Yes, you can find natural disasters where more people have died. You can find that in the past decade. But few disasters have as large a swath of destructiveness. And from a historical perspective that's nearly unprecidented.
 
Didn't they say the quake was a 9.0, imagine the damage that may have caused on land... of course it probably can't get any worse than it already is
 
[quote name='Admiral Ackbar']I dunno. I'm a news junky and have been watching the news pretty much Non-stop. And CNN is giving this much better coverage than MSNBC or Fox IMO. I'm not saying those news organizations aren;t covering it. But it's obvious the difference.

Last night Fox was showing video that CNN had aired the day before. Both Fox News and MSNBC had the LA Times reporter call in last night and he had called into CNN the day before.

And China does have a long history of flooding. They just had massive flooding a few years ago that I think killed a hundred thousand people. The state wouldn't allow the news to cover it in their country, which seems like a crime. When a natural disaster happens there, because of the population density, hundreds of thousands get killed. How many millions have died in the past couple years from Famine in North Korea?It is not just the death tool that makes this signifigant. It has an unprecedented regional effect. Yes, you can find natural disasters where more people have died. You can find that in the past decade. But few disasters have as large a swath of destructiveness. And from a historical perspective that's nearly unprecidented.[/quote]

When you have a regime that outright murders its own people by the gross, how much do you expect them to get excited when the planet competes with them? The old Soviet Union was also renown for keeping its natural disasters under wraps. Imagine if the Tanguska blast had occurred a few decades later. Of course, if it had occurred at any point in the 50's or 60's we probably wouldn't be having this conversation.
 
[quote name='Zenithian Legend']Didn't they say the quake was a 9.0, imagine the damage that may have caused on land... of course it probably can't get any worse than it already is[/quote]

It can happen. It has happened. The difference was that there were much fewer people in the world then. If the New Madrid fault ripped open again on the same level of power as 1811-1812 it could kill millions since the region is largely unprepared for a major earthquake. Back when the last big quake hit there the population was measured in the mere hundreds.

http://hsv.com/genlintr/newmadrd/

There was a major quake just as the first European explorers came to California. Based on the eyewitness accounts it is believed to have been stronger than anything seen in the 20th Century in the region. If something like that had hit Los Angeles in the 50's it would likely have been the worst natural disaster in US history. If it hit today it would still bad but the level of preparedness is vastly better.
 
[quote name='Toohumanlive']Hey guys whats the latest death count?[/quote]

I heard on Headline News about two hours ago it was 80,427 expected to top 100,000.
 
[quote name='Admiral Ackbar']I dunno. I'm a news junky and have been watching the news pretty much Non-stop. And CNN is giving this much better coverage than MSNBC or Fox IMO. I'm not saying those news organizations aren;t covering it. But it's obvious the difference.

Last night Fox was showing video that CNN had aired the day before. Both Fox News and MSNBC had the LA Times reporter call in last night and he had called into CNN the day before.

And China does have a long history of flooding. They just had massive flooding a few years ago that I think killed a hundred thousand people. The state wouldn't allow the news to cover it in their country, which seems like a crime. When a natural disaster happens there, because of the population density, hundreds of thousands get killed. How many millions have died in the past couple years from Famine in North Korea?It is not just the death tool that makes this signifigant. It has an unprecedented regional effect. Yes, you can find natural disasters where more people have died. You can find that in the past decade. But few disasters have as large a swath of destructiveness. And from a historical perspective that's nearly unprecidented.[/quote]

I know why you love CNN so much. You are the type of person that gets involved with a weekly "crusade." Next week, when something else happens, you will be blabbering about that. Why would fox news want to cover this 24/7 when they can report new developments as they happen instead of rehashing the same shit hour after hour.
 
this is really sad. I thought it was bad a few days ago but the numbers have quadrupled since then. They have my sympathies.

I have family in india, but luckily they are way up north. I am glad they are safe.
 
[quote name='bignick'][quote name='Admiral Ackbar']I dunno. I'm a news junky and have been watching the news pretty much Non-stop. And CNN is giving this much better coverage than MSNBC or Fox IMO. I'm not saying those news organizations aren;t covering it. But it's obvious the difference.

Last night Fox was showing video that CNN had aired the day before. Both Fox News and MSNBC had the LA Times reporter call in last night and he had called into CNN the day before.

And China does have a long history of flooding. They just had massive flooding a few years ago that I think killed a hundred thousand people. The state wouldn't allow the news to cover it in their country, which seems like a crime. When a natural disaster happens there, because of the population density, hundreds of thousands get killed. How many millions have died in the past couple years from Famine in North Korea?It is not just the death tool that makes this signifigant. It has an unprecedented regional effect. Yes, you can find natural disasters where more people have died. You can find that in the past decade. But few disasters have as large a swath of destructiveness. And from a historical perspective that's nearly unprecidented.[/quote]

I know why you love CNN so much. You are the type of person that gets involved with a weekly "crusade." Next week, when something else happens, you will be blabbering about that. Why would fox news want to cover this 24/7 when they can report new developments as they happen instead of rehashing the same shit hour after hour.[/quote]


ya, this is terrible. I can't believe people want to try to help. Bignick you response is bigjerk. I've not seen "It's a trap guy' get wrapped up in a crusade, eporbis, the more videos I watch the more your point of great architecture is irrelevant.
 
HOLY CRAP! I didn't watch tv for five days since I was on vacation and when I did see this on the news I was freaking shocked. 70,000 have already died and its just going to keep rising due to disease and other things.........
 
[quote name='Moxio']Oh God, this is way out of control.

May God shed his blessing upon the families whose loved ones were lost.[/quote]

Who's gonna cry for the families that were entirely consumed
 
[quote name='Lootr2Core'][quote name='bignick'][quote name='Admiral Ackbar']I dunno. I'm a news junky and have been watching the news pretty much Non-stop. And CNN is giving this much better coverage than MSNBC or Fox IMO. I'm not saying those news organizations aren;t covering it. But it's obvious the difference.

Last night Fox was showing video that CNN had aired the day before. Both Fox News and MSNBC had the LA Times reporter call in last night and he had called into CNN the day before.

And China does have a long history of flooding. They just had massive flooding a few years ago that I think killed a hundred thousand people. The state wouldn't allow the news to cover it in their country, which seems like a crime. When a natural disaster happens there, because of the population density, hundreds of thousands get killed. How many millions have died in the past couple years from Famine in North Korea?It is not just the death tool that makes this signifigant. It has an unprecedented regional effect. Yes, you can find natural disasters where more people have died. You can find that in the past decade. But few disasters have as large a swath of destructiveness. And from a historical perspective that's nearly unprecidented.[/quote]

I know why you love CNN so much. You are the type of person that gets involved with a weekly "crusade." Next week, when something else happens, you will be blabbering about that. Why would fox news want to cover this 24/7 when they can report new developments as they happen instead of rehashing the same shit hour after hour.[/quote]


ya, this is terrible. I can't believe people want to try to help. Bignick you response is bigjerk. I've not seen "It's a trap guy' get wrapped up in a crusade, eporbis, the more videos I watch the more your point of great architecture is irrelevant.[/quote]

Geez, you're as clueless as the BBC sitcom characters in your sig. Being glued to CNN does not constitute helping. It just living vicariously through TV with real people instead of actors in fictional settings.

I don't recall saying anything about "great architecture." That aesthetic quality would be entirely removed from structural integrity issues.

This week in Southern California we had some record setting weather. Nothing like the Indian Ocean situation but there was a fair amount of property damage. Even a tornado. By and large people are only suffering massive inconvenience and loss of material possessions. Put the same weather in any number of third world locations and the death toll would have been in the hundreds. Poverty kills. It forces people to make choices between high and low probablility threat while more effective societies cover both ends. The potential for an event like this wasn't any secret. It's been known since Krakatoa had immensely far reaching effects over 150 years ago. But when you have trouble scraping together protection against the things that plague your community almost every year, how can you justify investment against threat that may not appear in your lifetime. Societal wealth isn't about a TV in every home. It about not having your society disappear overnight at the whim of plate tectonics.
 
[quote name='epobirs'][quote name='Lootr2Core'][quote name='bignick'][quote name='Admiral Ackbar']I dunno. I'm a news junky and have been watching the news pretty much Non-stop. And CNN is giving this much better coverage than MSNBC or Fox IMO. I'm not saying those news organizations aren;t covering it. But it's obvious the difference.

Last night Fox was showing video that CNN had aired the day before. Both Fox News and MSNBC had the LA Times reporter call in last night and he had called into CNN the day before.

And China does have a long history of flooding. They just had massive flooding a few years ago that I think killed a hundred thousand people. The state wouldn't allow the news to cover it in their country, which seems like a crime. When a natural disaster happens there, because of the population density, hundreds of thousands get killed. How many millions have died in the past couple years from Famine in North Korea?It is not just the death tool that makes this signifigant. It has an unprecedented regional effect. Yes, you can find natural disasters where more people have died. You can find that in the past decade. But few disasters have as large a swath of destructiveness. And from a historical perspective that's nearly unprecidented.[/quote]

I know why you love CNN so much. You are the type of person that gets involved with a weekly "crusade." Next week, when something else happens, you will be blabbering about that. Why would fox news want to cover this 24/7 when they can report new developments as they happen instead of rehashing the same shit hour after hour.[/quote]


ya, this is terrible. I can't believe people want to try to help. Bignick you response is bigjerk. I've not seen "It's a trap guy' get wrapped up in a crusade, eporbis, the more videos I watch the more your point of great architecture is irrelevant.[/quote]

Geez, you're as clueless as the BBC sitcom characters in your sig. Being glued to CNN does not constitute helping. It just living vicariously through TV with real people instead of actors in fictional settings.

I don't recall saying anything about "great architecture." That aesthetic quality would be entirely removed from structural integrity issues.

This week in Southern California we had some record setting weather. Nothing like the Indian Ocean situation but there was a fair amount of property damage. Even a tornado. By and large people are only suffering massive inconvenience and loss of material possessions. Put the same weather in any number of third world locations and the death toll would have been in the hundreds. Poverty kills. It forces people to make choices between high and low probablility threat while more effective societies cover both ends. The potential for an event like this wasn't any secret. It's been known since Krakatoa had immensely far reaching effects over 150 years ago. But when you have trouble scraping together protection against the things that plague your community almost every year, how can you justify investment against threat that may not appear in your lifetime. Societal wealth isn't about a TV in every home. It about not having your society disappear overnight at the whim of plate tectonics.[/quote]


WHat are you talking about being glued to cnn every hour? So reading the online news each morning before work is odd? ALso, architecture takes into account ethestic effect but also deals with basic structural issues as well.
 
[quote name='bignick'] Why would fox news want to cover this 24/7 when they can report new developments as they happen instead of rehashing the same shit hour after hour.[/quote]

I'm so glad fox doesnt rehash the same shit hour after hour....."this just in, Sadam is a bad guy and French people suck, more after the Factor"
 
It's not like all I do is watch the news. But I will say that 60% of my TV viewing is C-span. I watch Washington Journal nearly daily. Book TV on the weekends. I call myself a news junky because compared to the average amaerican, I am a news junky. If I hadn't had gone into Engineering I would be a Journalist. I'm interested in public affairs, would like to become more politically active in a few years when I hit my thirties. I read all the news services pretty much.

I'm interested in this Tsunami because it is an unprecedented event. I just finished reading Krakatoa a month or two ago and that Tsunami killed 40,000. As I said, there have been other disasters in the last decade that have immense and even greater death tolls. Unfortunately, hardship and scrabble the likes of which I am lucky enough to never know, is common across the globe. Famine and pestilence is a fact of life. But this catastrophy is something unique. Something historic, and it's only natural to want to know what is happening.

My comments about the news coverage are not just about Fox but also MSNBC. The problem is this. For the past few years all the news services (Network and Cable) on TV have been cutting their foreign coverage to save money. They now use the wire services almost exclusively. Occasionally rushing spot journalists to a scene where they know something is happening well before hand.

But after this disaster, it's obvious that CNN is the only news service with the infrastructure around the globe to cover this disaster properly in the early hours. The coverage I've seen on Fox and MSNBC is literally video and stories that either CNN or a paper service has broken the day before.

Also I'm not saying it should be all Tsunami all the time. There is other news. For example the threat that the Filibuster will be weakened in the Senate. Or the recent ambushes in Iraq. But there's something wrong with a news service when they have a new age Guru advising what nuts to eat and how to avoid Alzheimers instead of covering how countries around the globe are organizing for the greatest disaster relief effort in the history of humanity!

I haven't actually watched the tv in the past 24 hours because I've been busy so things may have changed recently. And my comments are not just directed at Fox but also at MSNBC, which has lagged in its coverage. For national news you can argue it's even. For op-ed you could even argue that Fox does better on opinion coverage because that's the meat and potato of it's news service. But on international coverage I really think CNN is shining in getting the most information out to people.
 
[quote name='RichD1']http://quack-quack.net/wave.jpg

Yeah, don't click that link if you're a pussy. You WILL be sorry.[/quote]

....wow
 
[quote name='Cracka'][quote name='RichD1']http://quack-quack.net/wave.jpg

Yeah, don't click that link if you're a pussy. You WILL be sorry.[/quote]

....wow[/quote]

What's the picture?
 
[quote name='RichD1'][quote name='Moxio'][quote name='Cracka'][quote name='RichD1']http://quack-quack.net/wave.jpg

Yeah, don't click that link if you're a pussy. You WILL be sorry.[/quote]

....wow[/quote]

What's the picture?[/quote]

An edited version of:

http://koti.mbnet.fi/speedou/Tsunam/ruumiita4ft.jpg

Again, don't click if you're a pussy.[/quote]

that link doesn't work for me.
 
Yeah they took it down apparently. It was just a bigger pic of mine with many more dead people. It was awesome.
 
[quote name='RichD1']Yeah they took it down apparently. It was just a bigger pic of mine with many more dead people. It was awesome.[/quote]

are you sure Awesome is the word you want to use ? More like tragic or gruesome. I know what a corpse looks like when it's been in the water for a few days. I don't think it's awesome.
 
Nah, awesome was the word I wanted to use.

I honestly don't care for these people. Maybe a little sympathy for it being so unfortunately, but honestly, it doesn't affect me.
 
Awesome isn't a word that means "oh goody", I could say the awesome effects of the quake meaining the strength of the quake. Even terrific doesn't mean good, it means huge damage, and shit.

There are more meanings to the words than one.

And RichD1, I hope that if the East Coast shore is going to get hit with one, and you need help, that people will spit on you and go "it doesn't affect me" and walk away.
 
[quote name='David85']Awesome isn't a word that means "oh goody", I could say the awesome effects of the quake meaining the strength of the quake. Even terrific doesn't mean good, it means huge damage, and shit.

There are more meanings to the words than one.

And RichD1, I hope that if the East Coast shore is going to get hit with one, and you need help, that people will spit on you and go "it doesn't affect me" and walk away.[/quote]

I don't expect some fucking Sri Lankans to come on an internet message board and mourn my death if the east coast is hit. If there's a picture of me dead that can be turned funny, I fully expect it to be done. I know I'd do it.
 
[quote name='RichD1'][quote name='David85']Awesome isn't a word that means "oh goody", I could say the awesome effects of the quake meaining the strength of the quake. Even terrific doesn't mean good, it means huge damage, and shit.

There are more meanings to the words than one.

And RichD1, I hope that if the East Coast shore is going to get hit with one, and you need help, that people will spit on you and go "it doesn't affect me" and walk away.[/quote]

I don't expect some shaq-fuing Sri Lankans to come on an internet message board and mourn my death if the east coast is hit. If there's a picture of me dead that can be turned funny, I fully expect it to be done. I know I'd do it.[/quote]

I wouldn't expect it either since you are a shaq-fuing asshat. Man, what a douchebag.
 
[quote name='Lootr2Core'][quote name='epobirs'][quote name='Lootr2Core'][quote name='bignick'][quote name='Admiral Ackbar']I dunno. I'm a news junky and have been watching the news pretty much Non-stop. And CNN is giving this much better coverage than MSNBC or Fox IMO. I'm not saying those news organizations aren;t covering it. But it's obvious the difference.

Last night Fox was showing video that CNN had aired the day before. Both Fox News and MSNBC had the LA Times reporter call in last night and he had called into CNN the day before.

And China does have a long history of flooding. They just had massive flooding a few years ago that I think killed a hundred thousand people. The state wouldn't allow the news to cover it in their country, which seems like a crime. When a natural disaster happens there, because of the population density, hundreds of thousands get killed. How many millions have died in the past couple years from Famine in North Korea?It is not just the death tool that makes this signifigant. It has an unprecedented regional effect. Yes, you can find natural disasters where more people have died. You can find that in the past decade. But few disasters have as large a swath of destructiveness. And from a historical perspective that's nearly unprecidented.[/quote]

I know why you love CNN so much. You are the type of person that gets involved with a weekly "crusade." Next week, when something else happens, you will be blabbering about that. Why would fox news want to cover this 24/7 when they can report new developments as they happen instead of rehashing the same shit hour after hour.[/quote]


ya, this is terrible. I can't believe people want to try to help. Bignick you response is bigjerk. I've not seen "It's a trap guy' get wrapped up in a crusade, eporbis, the more videos I watch the more your point of great architecture is irrelevant.[/quote]

Geez, you're as clueless as the BBC sitcom characters in your sig. Being glued to CNN does not constitute helping. It just living vicariously through TV with real people instead of actors in fictional settings.

I don't recall saying anything about "great architecture." That aesthetic quality would be entirely removed from structural integrity issues.

This week in Southern California we had some record setting weather. Nothing like the Indian Ocean situation but there was a fair amount of property damage. Even a tornado. By and large people are only suffering massive inconvenience and loss of material possessions. Put the same weather in any number of third world locations and the death toll would have been in the hundreds. Poverty kills. It forces people to make choices between high and low probablility threat while more effective societies cover both ends. The potential for an event like this wasn't any secret. It's been known since Krakatoa had immensely far reaching effects over 150 years ago. But when you have trouble scraping together protection against the things that plague your community almost every year, how can you justify investment against threat that may not appear in your lifetime. Societal wealth isn't about a TV in every home. It about not having your society disappear overnight at the whim of plate tectonics.[/quote]


WHat are you talking about being glued to cnn every hour? So reading the online news each morning before work is odd? ALso, architecture takes into account ethestic effect but also deals with basic structural issues as well.[/quote]

You've apparently lost track of how this conversation started. And no, architecture has no bearing at all on regional construction codes. Your local homeowners association may place limits on architecture but the county, city, state, etc. only cares about issues such as the wiring not electrocuting the inhabitants under the normal range of conditions. When I speak of matters such as that architecture doesn't enter into it. The inspector doesn't care if the house is Colonial, Victorian or a split-level Ranch Duplex, just so long as it doesn't fall over in a strong breeze.
 
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