Irresponsible reporting

[AirBill]

The following story aired on Channel 11 here in St. Louis tonight:

http://wb11tv.trb.com/kplr-news-102004-2,0,6264179.story?coll=kplr-home-2

I'm so angry, I could bite through nails. I left the newspaper business because of crap like this. I used to defend the profession, but no more.

Read the article, then write the management at [email protected] and [email protected] and tell them what you think. The phone number also is 314-447-1111.

To whom it may concern:

I am a captain for an airline that flies regional jets. I am writing in regard to some factual errors regarding your coverage of the Corporate Airlines crash in Kirksville.

I take issue with two positions taken by your report:

1) That the aircraft involved was a "regional jet."

2) That regional jets are, somehow, less safe and may have contributed to this accident.

I quote from your report:


The commuter or regional jet left Lambert Field shortly before seven Tuesday night. 13 passengers and two crew members were on board. The group was headed to an educational conference at Kirksville College of Osteopathic Medicine. The pilot made contact with the Kirksville Regional Airport at 7:33 p.m. to land, but somehow crashed on the final approach. Sergeant Brent Bernhardt from the Missouri Highway Patrol said, "At this point there is no sign that there was distress there was no sign that there were any problems aboard the aircraft."

The regional jet was American Connection 5966, which is owned by Corporate Airlines based in Tennessee. The airline provides 70 flights from 13 cities in the Midwest. At Lambert Wednesday, American Connection cancelled all flights to Kirksville. The crash left some commuter plane passengers concerned. Jeff Scott said, "I think about that all the time you put you life into your own hands when your flying."


As a former newspaper reporter, I find your reporter's use of the term regional jet to be both lazy and inaccurate. The aircraft in question is a Jetstream 32, which is not a jet. It is a turboprop, which most people can tell apart from a jet. Certainly, a reporter who covers this story should be able to.

Next, exactly why would passengers need to be concerned? I understand that all passengers have some apprehension about flying, and aviation accidents amplify these fears. But there is no evidence to suggest that regional jets are somehow less safe than larger aircraft, and there certainly is no evidence that it caused this accident! It is a perception, however unfounded, that we are well familiar with and is only worsened by your irresponsible reporting. Fact is, in the United States, only one "regional jet" has ever crashed since these jets went into service, and that was last week. But I guess it's too much to expect your reporters to track down this information.

Finally, this paragraph just about floored me:

Just last week a similar regional jet crashed near Jefferson City. The pilot and co-pilot were killed. Lambert officials say many air carriers are shifting to the regional jet concept, at least until air traffic picks up.

For starters, that aircraft was a Canadair Regional Jet. This aircraft was a turboprop. But the factual error is the least of my concern with these three sentences. As an editor, you should realize that "similar regional jet" and "many air carriers are shifting to the regional jet concept" would lead viewers, again, to believe that these aircraft are somehow less safe.

What is this idea doing in this story? It is a story about one air crash, NOT about the regional jet industry. If you want to go after their safety record, do it in a real story. Go out and get the facts, and report it. If you do, you'll find that these aircraft -- and the Jetstream 32 and the pilots who fly them -- have excellent safety records. Don't put out some shabby, lazy, half-cooked drivel of ideas that your story can't support because your reporter either doesn't know how or didn't feel like getting the facts straight.

I left newspapers for many reasons, but a big one was because I felt the field was becoming more interested in hype than reporting. This story has affirmed my decision. What a terrible, terrible disservice your reporter and your company have done.

 

[WolfManPack]

Bravo!

And again I say Bravo!

I used to work in the news broadcast industry myself and it's absolutely amazing the incompetence, and bias I might add, is capable of.

By the way I worked as a meteorologist....not in the news department....just wanted to clear that little facto up!

Great post man and you are to be commended for calling the media out on this one! If more people would do what you did then they WOULD change...sad thing is though most of us are too lazy!

 

[Corona]

Hope you post that letter tomorrow. I have also seen multiple instances where the media refers to the 'ol Jetstream as a "jet". If it says "Jetstream", must be a "jet", huh?
I especially liked the part about two passengers jumping out. Did they wait till the airplane was just a couple feet off the ground, or did they bail out at FL 190? Hey, I've had a couple bad days flying the Jetpig, but never actually jumped out. How do you jump out of a cruising jet, anyway?
I started a thread a while back about trying to educate the media on aviation. It was a stupid idea, I admit.
On a more serious note, I did just see on the news (yes, I know) that the aircraft may have broken apart in flight.
C

 

[AV80R]

To AirBill:


As a former Corpex pilot or actually just as a regular pilot I would like to say THANK YOU.

You are 100% correct and I wish more reporters would take their profession more seriously.

You know how easily a pilot can get in trouble with the FAA for making inaccurate statements. I wish the journalists were held to the same high standards and would actually research their stories before putting them in print.


Once again – THANK YOU!

av80r

 

[Stifler's Mom]

Amazingly, two passengers, both from Utah, jumped from the plane moments before impact and were found alive just feet from the crash site.

 

[AirBill]

Amazingly, two passengers, both from Utah, jumped from the plane moments before impact and were found alive just feet from the crash site.

I had to let that one go. The letter was getting a little long.

The Chicago News Bureau used to have a saying: If your mother says she loves you, check it out.

I think that's lost on most J-school grads these days.

 

[wscrj]

To AirBill:

Done...as requested.

That really was a pathetic article.

wscrj

 

[pkjohnsonm]

To AirBill:

Thankyou for standing up for the industry. It is these kinds of lazy, irresponsible, and poorly researched stories that give our industry a bad name. The media always wants to talk about the few and far between fatal accidents that occur in aviation, but never ever says anything about the thousands of daily flights that make it off the ground and back on with absolutely no problems at all. Its also because of these poor stories that the general public can't figure out that it is more safe to be up in an aircraft w/ 1000+ft of seperation from other aircraft than it is to be in an automobile going 70+mph heading the opposite direction of hundreds of other vehicles going the same speeds seperated by a whopping 10-20ft. People just don't seem to get it. I will definitely be writing KPLR 11. Thanks Again