Media and Disasters

First published in 1993, The Media and Disasters looks behind the key scenes in the drama unfolding in the aftermath of the Pan Am 103 explosion: Lockerbie, visited by an estimated 1000 journalists in the month following the disaster; New York’s Kennedy Airport, where families learned in the presence of the media that their loved ones had perished; Syracuse University, plunged into mourning the loss of 35 students from the school’s study abroad programme; and homes on both sides of the Atlantic, grief-stricken as news reached relatives of the passengers and crew.

The authors, professors of communication at Syracuse University with years of media experience, began looking at the effects of such coverage because of what they experienced when the media came to cover the grieving on their campus. What they learned in the U.S. and the U.K. will interest those concerned about media coverage of crisis events, as well as those who communicate about them: journalists, survivors, public information officers, public relations practitioners, emergency support personnel, business and political leaders.