Running head: HARD NEWS STORY ANALYSIS

Carnival Cruise Loses Power Melissa Todd Kent State University

HARD NEWS STORY ANALYSIS

Late Sunday night early Monday morning February 10th and 11th information flooded the CNN news room. The newscast involved a power outage on a Carnival Cruise ship and was immediately given the attention and urgency it needed. Coverage of the power outage was on almost every station including CNN and FOX. This specific article was found on CNN at the following URL: http://www.cnn.com/2013/02/15/travel/cruise-ship-fire. The CNN network which is owned by two companies Time Warner and the U.S news channel aired the Carnival Cruise investigation Sunday evening with follow ups and more details Monday morning continuing throughout the week. It was headlines like On crippled ship, icky jobs fell on amazing crew that stirred up talk among its viewers. Tony and Jenny Larocca, two of the passengers on the cruise ship planned to share their first vacation together when a fire cut off the ships power supply. Individuals like Tony, Jenny and many others were on their 3rd day of a four day cruise when the fire occurred. Perhaps the biggest problem passengers faced was that the power outage put toilets out of order, a necessity every human cant go without. Individuals were forced to live around the horrible smell of urine and feces that pored across the floors and down the cruise hallways. Allie Taylor a 12 years old passenger was quoted saying I just wanted to vomit, like every second probably. Due to being stranded out in the middle of the ocean, a beautiful cruise ship into a floating port-o-potty, complete with foul smells and lack of sanitary items (Burnett, 2013). The story focuses largely on the jobs that crew members performed in order to ensure the sanity of the passengers. However, very little detail follows the exact duties that crew members had to complete. With no power and no running water you can only imagine the disgusting jobs that had to be job. The story by CNN also focuses on the consequences that are to come from the incident. Injuries and

Running head: HARD NEWS STORY ANALYSIS

lawsuits were sure to come and CNN started investigating right after they were informed on Sunday February 10th. One of the larger problems was how this stranded cruise ship would return to land and how long it would take to do this. The report focused on three reasons that certain decisions would be hard to estimate or predict. First the decision on how to tow the ship back to a port, second factoring in the strong currents that pushed the vessel towards alternate port options, and last the sheer size of the problem. A 900ft long ship holding 4,000 passengers and crew members would obviously take a tremendous amount of time and energy and needed to be planned precisely and in a timely manner. The attention of the CNN news viewers were captured in a couple different ways. First the conflict involved many people being stranded in unsanitary circumstances. Drama and conflict grabs attention through the stories and details told by the passengers involving the smells and sleeping adjustments that had to be made. The tasks that some of the crew members performed also gained attention because of how disturbing and disgusting they were. For many passengers this cruise was one of their first experiences out at sea, and for most one of the worst memories of their lives. The details involving the fire, passenger health and safe return are the exact details that drew attention and concern to the viewer audience. For example, mentioning that the crew had the nasty job of picking up bags filled with human waste shows the extent of the unsanitary conditions (Drash, 2013). Tension created by the situation affected the passengers and was minutely solved by the reported amazing effect of the crew. Interviews with the crew report their feelings and they believe that they were just doing their job, no matter what happens they signed up to take care of the passengers and that is what they intended to do.

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This event was planned far in advance. Most passengers received this glamorous get away as a Christmas present, honeymoon gift, or just a fun family vacation. There were obviously no plans that a small fire would in fact disable the entire cruise and no recreation of the events took place not even to show how the fire was started. This story was very special because of how unique the situation happened to be. Since the story of the titanic and its unfortunate fate many years ago viewers find a great interest in stories involving ships being stranded. There is a lot of preparation and testing occurs before a cruise ship actually heads off out to sea. This story is unique because it is not often that a fire erupts on a cruise that just happens to fry a small but specific area that controls the power of the entire ship. Passengers reported major problems such as long lines to get food, scare amounts of fresh water and boredom. The odors from the clogged toilets made the heat below deck unbearable forcing many people to sleep in the hallways or outside in hope to escape the smells. One of the most surprising and unique details of this report were the difference in reactions from passengers. Some passengers like Norma Reyes vowed to never go on another Carnival cruise calling it toxic and horrible. Reyes was thankful the fire had been contained but focused more on where she may be if it had not, either floating in the ocean or dead. Brett Klausman and his wife were must more forgiving, possibly because they had a balcony room that had plenty of fresh air. They turned the lack of power into an escape and admitted it was nice to just chill. The ongoing theme of this story focuses on vacationing and the many experiences that can come while on them. Research led to similar stories in the past. In November 2010 a Carnival cruise ship vessel also stranded for three days with 4,500 people. Comparable stories described a trip from hell with limited food, power, and bathroom access. Other stories that relate to the Carnival Cruise power loss focus on the joy brought to passengers when reunited with

Running head: HARD NEWS STORY ANALYSIS

family and civilization. These stories focus on a more positive experience of a journey coming to an end. Unfortunately for the Carnival Cruise Company related stories focus on the first lawsuit that was filed by passenger Cassie Terry. Immediately after returning home Terry hired an attorney located in the Houston area who filed a lawsuit. The lawsuit explains that the Carnival failed to provide a seaworthy ship with sanitary condition. Related stories go into detail of the apologies from the CEO of Carnival and the refunds given. Passengers were given 500$, a free flight home, no credit chargers, and a refund for a whole new cruise experience in the future. These actiond seemed less than acceptable to Terry who claims she suffered physical and emotional harm while on the cruise, something that cannot be fixed by a simple apology and refund to go on another cruise. The larger picture of this event focuses on all the possible outcomes that can come from an experience like the Carnival cruise. I think this was truly a hard news story. It defiantly was a personalized report because the emotion of the passengers were captured and elaborated on. The situation was unique and out of the ordinary. The report involved people dealing with unsanitary unhealthy living conditions which created drama and controversy. It captured attention when describing the type of tasks that the crew completed involving feces. I believe that any story with good intention that turn for the worst are hard news stories. This report was on every station because it stirred up emotions within people. Any person can imagine and relate to how terrible is must have been to deal with the odor while being stranded in the middle of the ocean. This story is missing a re-inaction but I do not think that is necessary in order to comprehend what happened. We all know what a fire looks like what it starts and is put out and no one wants to reenact any of the jobs involving feces the crew had to perform. From this assignment I learned what components make up a hard news story and how it differs from regular newscasts. I think the most important part of a hard news

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story is how and why it capture the audiences attention because that is what makes people want to know more and follow the story as detailed are figured out and problems are solved.

Running head: HARD NEWS STORY ANALYSIS

References

Drash, W. (2013, February 11). On crippled cruise ship, icky jobs fell to amazing crew. Retrieved from http://www.cnn.com/2013/02/15/travel/triumph-cruise-crew

Burnett, E. (2013, February 14). How cruise went from luxury to misery. Retrieved from http://www.cnn.com/video/?iid=article_sidebar