Un-be-freakin'-lievable

[HForrest]

Bad information. 12 out of 13 miners are, in fact, dead- not the other way around, as everyone had previously believed. The families of the trapped mine workers, after almost 40 hours of worrying and knowing the odds against their relatives were slim, were told a few hours ago that 12 out of 13 were, in fact, alive. They rejoiced and celebrated until a little less than an hour ago, when officials found out that this was bad information- only one is alive.

Pretty amazing how such misinformation spreads so fast, and gets accepted my media and officials so instantly, with no one thinking to confirm it. I remember seeing when they were initially reporting the 12 miners alive- my very first thought was "Have they confirmed that? How reliable is this? No one is saying anything about sources." And here it is... was watching CNN, and a woman and her two kids had run out of the church as chaos erupted when the coal company informed family members about the bad news, and brought the information to Anderson Cooper... after which, all the reports started flooding in and then the press conference with the company followed. Pretty shocking. Someone jumping the gun made a bad situation much worse- I can only imagine what it must be like for the families.

[Azrael256]

This is one of the few times that I feel compelled to say that I am speechless.  I can come up with absolutely no words for this.

[Waitone]

I'm not.  A horrible story.  I simply can not imagine the loss.

I also can not imagine the inept coverage that would allow such an error to make it to air.

Media is paid to be first.  Media is not paid to be first and right.

[TarpleyG]

Okay, just playing devil's advocate here but haven't you all made a mistake in the past?  Sure, it's was a crappy thing for the families but stuff happens.  On a brighter note, look for some sort of "lawsuit" against the media about this because it seems every single time something doesn't go someone's way someone else gets sued.

Greg

[richyoung]

Mark my words,...this will turn out to be some media puke eavesdropping on the emergency/rescue commo, and misunderstanding what they were trying to report.  This is just like trying to call Florida for a presidential election - everybody HAS to be FIRST....

[Lennyjoe]

Word has it that a call went to the command post from the rescue party that "they found them".  Someone from the command post called a family member at the church and passed on that "they found them alive".  Word spread from there.

Of course, that was heard on the news as well.  Its tragic that they didn't survive.  My wife's family has worked in the coal mines for years.  He grandpa died from black lung disease.  They all knew that coal mining was dangerous but it had to be done to survive.  Not alot of industry in WVA other than coal mining.  

May the Lord bless the families and friends and comfort them in the hard times they are going thru.

[Guest]

The tragedy is NOT that the media broadcast this news on the air. Those of us sitting on our couches had no real stake in the issue. Sure its irresponsible, but we had little suffering due to the news. The tragedy is that the misinformation was given to the families, and all available information right now is that they had the news well before the media broadcast it.

[chaim]

I can't imagine the families' feelings.  They were all worried and grieving that their family members might be dead.  Then a miracle appears to have occurred and almost all survived.  These families were taken to emotional highs you and I can only imagine.  Then 3 hours later they are told essentially "opps, we were wrong, only one survived, 12 died".  Can you imagine the pain, especially right after the relief of "knowing" that their family members survived?  

Also, the way the company handled it was terrible.  According to families it was just a terse announcement, very short, and then out the door.  The news reports have it that the company knew after just 20 minutes that the original reports were incorrect, but they let the families rejoice for nearly another 3 hours before letting the families know what actually happened to their family members.  Add to that the long history of safety violations and I think if it was one of my family in that mine I'd be absolutely livid.  I really do think there will be a lot more about this in coming days (though with Americans short attention span, by then most people will ignore it).