Grumpy Editor

Casey Anthony trial tops Bing’s 2011 most searched list

Already, one month before year’s end, and a Bing top 10 list of most searched news stories for 2011 is the first out of the chute, notes Grumpy Editor. 

Search engine Bing, from Microsoft Corp., tallied news items on high profile trials of Casey Anthony (tops on the list) and Michael Jackson/Dr. Conrad Murray (No. 7) as among those getting the most attention. 

Also sought by inquisitive minds were natural disasters Hurricane Irene (No. 3), Japan’s earthquake and tsunami (No. 4) and the Joplin tornado (No. 6). 

Remembrances ranking high included the 9/11 10-year anniversary (No. 8) and the one-year anniversary of the Haiti earthquake (No. 10). 

How they stacked up for Bing searchers: 

• Casey Anthony trial
• Osama bin Laden death
• Hurricane Irene
• Japan earthquake/tsunami
• Amy Winehouse death
• Joplin tornado
• Michael Jackson/Dr. Conrad Murray trial
• 9/11 10-year anniversary
• Republican candidates Herman Cain, Rick Perry
• Haiti anniversary 

Interestingly, nothing connected to Congress, jobs, taxes, economy or unusual stock market gyrations made the top 10.

 

AP mixes earthquakes, wildfires with global warming

With an unusual amount of extreme weather this year --- including hurricanes, tropical storms, tornadoes, blizzards, heat and drought --- it wasn’t a surprise to see an Associated Press story on nature’s fury appear over the weekend that suggested recent meteorological events were linked to global warming, notes Grumpy Editor. 

And to complete nature’s action so far in 2011, writer Seth Borenstein worked into the story’s second paragraph non-meteorological-related recent Virginia, Colorado and Alaska earthquakes plus record wildfires in Arizona and New Mexico. 

The story cited Germany-based insurance company Munich Re tallied 98 natural disasters in the U.S. in this year’s first half, “about double the average in the 1990s” --- without indicating how many were related to weather. 

Nevertheless, recent “weather catastrophes” gave the writer an opportunity to compose this Las Vegas-style line: 

“Man-made global warming is increasing the odds of getting a bad roll of the dice." 

In summarizing what climate scientists said, toward the end of the text the writer mentioned, “Individual weather disasters so far can’t be directly attributed to global warming, but”… 

Thus, the global warming saga continues.

 

Look for another ‘Big One’ quake story to appear soon

In the wake of three major earthquakes in the news since Monday night, don’t be surprised to soon see another in a series (with Associated Press the best candidate) pointing to an upcoming “Big One” in California, figures Grumpy Editor. 

Inspiration comes from a 5.3 magnitude earthquake that rattled the Colorado-New Mexico border Monday night, a 5.8 shaker than rumbled along the East Coast on Tuesday and a 6.9 temblor that hit northern Peru’s jungle region yesterday. 

Of the trio, the East Coast quake that sent people into the streets in Washington, D.C., and New York City, stirred up the most action, grabbing hefty national air time and newspaper space Tuesday, yesterday and into today. 

Periodically, AP reminds print and broadcast media --- so they can shake up readers/viewers --- that the “Big One” is coming. 

Grumpy Editor feels another reminder is in the works. 

One alarming example from a past AP story:  “California faces an almost certain risk of being rocked by a strong earthquake by 2037.” 

For that outlook, AP cited a seismic forecast by scientists that pointed to a magnitude 6.7 quake (equal to the 1994 Northridge jolt) or larger within 26 years. 

Another past AP “shake ‘em up” story stemmed from a hypothetical model, worked up by scientists, that indicated a mighty 7.8 magnitude earthquake would “see Los Angeles and its suburbs shake like a bowl of jelly” in less than two minutes and 50,000 people would be injured in Southern California. 

That would exceed the estimated 7.7 magnitude quake that rattled the lower section of the San Andreas Fault in Southern California 321 years ago and a 7.8 earth mover 154 years ago in Central California.

However, further earthquake coverage will take a back seat as strengthening Hurricane Irene moves up along the East Coast, affecting some of the same areas hit by Tuesday's shaker.

Weather and related developments such as power outages and flooding will be the focus of news coverage over the next few days and into the weekend.  

 

 

Expect ‘what if’ earthquake print/TV stories this week

In the aftermath of the earthquake and tsunami that slammed Japan on Friday, look for a bumper crop of stories by print and broadcast media this week with a “what if an earthquake happens here” angle, predicts Grumpy Editor.

First out of the chute, warning of problems with earth-shaking ahead, surprisingly comes from the relatively quiet seismic state of Utah rather than earthquake-prone California.

Weber State University geosciences professor Adolph Yonkee tells the Standard-Examiner in Ogden, just north of Salt Lake City, that a maximum quake on the nearby Wasatch fault could come tomorrow or 500 years from now.

The Wasatch fault, on the western edge of Wasatch Mountains, runs about 240 miles from southern Idaho to central Utah.

Problems from a major earthquake in Utah, writes Nancy Van Valkenburg, would be landslides and soil liquefaction, a situation where “soil fails to support solid objects and can become like quicksand, causing surface structures and objects to tilt or sink.”

Valkenburg notes the Utah Geological Survey says that state’s Weber and Davis counties have been hit by five major quakes --- in the past 6,500 years, the last being 500 years ago.

Meanwhile, with California’s San Andreas Fault a “breeding ground” for underground rumblings, expect the bulk of “what if” stories to originate with a California dateline.

One of the first to go airborne in the Golden State is Fox affiliate TV station KTXL, Sacramento.  It alerts viewers to "what if the Japan quake hit California instead?"

And with any such story on earthquakes --- which scientists cannot predict the way meteorologists can forecast weather --- look for the dredging up of alarming-to-readers-or viewers terms such as “the big one,” “underground stress building” and “an increased risk of a major temblor.”