Jaws Lead

The shark that was allegedly responsible for the deaths of two youths from Amity Island was caught today, bringing an end to the terror that gripped the town just in time for the fourth of July celebration.

Bruce, pt. 3

A meeting was held today at the Amity town hall, regarding the recent deaths of two youths while they were swimming in the ocean.
While it has not been confirmed the deceased, Alex Kitner and Chrissie Watson were believed by many to have been attacked by a shark.
At the meeting police chief Martin Brody said that the beaches would be closed for 24 hours, much to the chagrin of the business owners attending the meeting. Chief Brody went on to say that the town would be "bringing in experts from the oceanographic institute on the main land"
The meeting was then interrupted by Ben Quint, a local fisherman who offered to find and kill the alleged shark for a price of $10,000.
"I'll catch him and I'll kill him," Quint said, "For 10 you get the head, the tail, the whole thing."
The hire of Quint has been taken under advisement.

Movies about journalism

I recently watched Safety Not Guaranteed, a movie about a journalist and his two interns trying to write a story about a strange newspaper ad that said "Wanted: Somebody to go back in time with me. This is not a joke. P.O. Box 91 Ocean View, WA 99393. You'll get paid after we get back. Must bring your own weapons. Safety not guaranteed. I have only done this once before."
It was not only a really good movie, but it also in my opinion gave a realistic example of what covering a story is really like.
Does anyone else have a favorite journalism movie?

Bruce, pt 2

A second death occurred on the beaches of Amity Island today, after a body was found early this morning, and then a young boy was apparently attacked by a shark this afternoon.
It is unclear whether the incidents are related, but Chrissie Watson, 17 this morning, and Alex Kintner were both killed in the water.
Many eyewitnesses who saw the attack on Kintner said he was attacked by a shark, and the body of Watson was found mauled on the beach. The beach was very crowded on this hot day, and many people were in the water around Kintner, who was floating on his raft.
It has not been determined whether a shark was involved, but a town meeting has been called and will occur at 6 p.m. today in Town Hall.
The mother of the boy, who was present when the accident occurred, is currently being treated for shock at Amity Hospital.

Bruce!

This morning, a young girl was found dead at South Beach after she went swimming during a late night drinking party.The girl's body was discovered early this morning on the beach by police, after a call to them was placed by Christopher P. Hoggenbottam III, who was with the girl at the time of the accident.It was said by police chief Martin Brody that the deceased entered the water, and was not seen again until her body was washed up onto the shore. The girl was mauled by an unknown attacker, and a shark attack has not been ruled out by officials.Though the possibility of a shark attack exists, police have made it clear that it was an isolated incident and that the beaches will remain open.
Witnesses at the party said that both Watson and Hoggenbottam III had been drinking, and possibly had been smoking marijuana. 

Where's Fluffy?

A rare Romanian spotted leopard escaped from the Durham Zoo this morning, leaving police and zoo officials scrambling to find the lost cat.

            Pandemonium broke loose after it was discovered that Fluffy, the extremely rare leopard, was not in her cage. Zoo director Gerry Durell held a press conference as rescue efforts were already underway stating, “everything about her cage seemed normal.” Though efforts to locate the prized feline have continued throughout the morning, Durell went on to say, “We have no idea what time Fluffy escaped or where she went.

            Fluffy, who was given as a gift to the Durham Zoo from a zoo in Romania, is considered to be a priceless animal. The Romanian spotted leopard is on the brink of extinction with only five known in existence, with Fluffy being the only female. She was scheduled next month to be flown to China to mate with a male spotted leopard owned by the Chinese government in an effort to help keep the species from extinction.

            Though the animal is extremely rare the police are taking any action necessary to insure the safety of the people of Durham. In a statement Police Chief William Blair said, “We will search every inch of this zoo. If possible Fluffy will be shot with a tranquilizer gun. But, if necessary, we will shoot to kill.

            The police and zoo officials are working against the clock because according to Blair the leopard is “nearly impossible to find in the dark-they can see everything, and we are blind.” Also heightening the importance of finding Fluffy is the area surrounding the zoo.

            “We are concerned because this is a residential area with an elementary school and many daycare centers and we don’t want Fluffy wandering around after kids get out of school,” Blair went on to say. To help with the search, the National Guard has supplied five helicopters with infrared sensors to help locate the lost jungle cat.

            Kitty Smith, the zoo’s chief zoologist instructed everyone that if they encounter Fluffy to “get slowly to the ground, go limp and stay still. Avoid eye contact at all costs.”

            Fluffy, who weighs 146 pounds and can run speeds of up to 60 MPH will only hurt someone if she is “cornered-or encountered on a dark night or in a dark alley,” Smith later said.

            An initial uproar of Fluffy’s disappearance was caused by the pull of a fire alarm. James Petronkis, 36, of Newmarket visits Fluffy at the zoo everyday was immediately concerned about the cat’s absence from her cage. “I told the guard and he said ‘Mind your own business.’ I couldn’t believe it. So I pulled a fire alarm and that got their attention.”

            Even after he sounded the alarm, Petronkis said it took another half an hour until police believed him that Fluffy was missing. That is when the mayhem started, he says as “police cars came from every direction and within minutes they were roughly pushing visitors towards the exits. Cops with guns drawn were everywhere.”

The French Connection

After a gunman took control of a New York City Subway train, a collision occurred between his train and another, launching himself and the other passengers on to the floor.

The morning started out as any other would, the crisp biting air of fall surrounded Paul Rubensteinn IV, as she sat on the train waiting to arrive at her job as a saleswomen of live seals. 

Suddenly, the seemingly normal morning turned into a day that she will not soon forget.

"I heard yelling in the train car behind me,

Witness: Ashley 

Accuracy: 6

MLK Speech

Hundreds of thousands of people stood in the shadow of the Lincoln Memorial yesterday, to hear about a dream.

            In the sweltering heat of the late August afternoon, Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. voice rang out to the masses, telling them all about the dreams he has: “I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal."”

            With this the crowd, a mix of both black and white people, cheered for the man and his dream, a dream shared by everyone in attendance.

            The speech captivated the crowd unlike any speech had ever done. According to James Reston, a New York Times reporter who was in attendance, “Dr. King touched all the themes of the day, only better than anybody else. He was full of the symbolism of Lincoln and Gandhi, and the cadences of the Bible.”

            The gathering was at first met with opposition from Washington officials, for fear that the speech made by Dr. King would lead to a riot by the audience. But he made it clear this was not his purpose during his speech, stating “We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.” This was met with a boom of applause, and the masses heeded this message of non-violence, as no riot broke out after the rally had ended.

            King, a well-known civil rights leader, captivated the crowd with his passion and adept skill as a speaker. 

Spa shut down in prostitution probe

In West Bridgewater, MA a spa was raided because of it being a prostitution ring. According to the article, an undercover police officer went to the spa where he was offered sex for a fee, which caused the police to raid the facility.
The title of the article, which is the subject of this post, caught my eye immediately caught my eye as I was perusing the news section of the Boston Globe. When I read the story, I went through a mental checklist to see if this was news. It definitely has the novelty factor that you are looking for in the news.
I also looked at the lead which was
"A West Bridgewater spa under investigation for allegedly being a site for prostitution has been shut down following a raid by police and Department of Homeland Security agents on Tuesday, West Bridgewater police said."
This lead, though it did the job of the lead, was not very interesting or as eye-catching as the title.

Mostly the news I receive comes from ESPN or ESPN.com, which many might not consider this a real source of news, but sports news is important news to me. One thing that has worn be out about it though is the coverage of Michael Jordan turning 50 today. Now my birthday usually lasts a day, but ESPN has been covering this for a week straight now, and though it is almost impossible to get tired of watching MJ highlights, I am getting very close. But this makes me wonder about other stories I heard over and over again, and how this affected how I read, or listened to the news in general.

Car Accident story

Late last night, a car accident occurred on Mile Hill road in Belmont, MA. There were three people in the car when at 9 p.m. it swerved off the road and landed on its roof. 

Driving the car was 17-year old Jamie Peterson, according to Lt.. Judith Barkus of the Belmont Police Department. Along with Peterson in the car were two young females, who were trapped in the car for over 45 minutes before police could rescue them. Their names have yet to be released.

First to the scene was Tom Carroll, Jr., 17, who was driving on Mile Hill road as the accident occurred. Carroll arrived at the accident and “thought the worst. They were flying.”

According to police, Peterson was able to crawl from the wreckage, while the other two passengers had to be rescued by the Jaws of Life. The victims were taken to Belmont’s Memorial Hospital, where one is in stable condition and the other had to be airlifted to Mass. General Hospital in Boston.

According to a hospital spokesperson, a car accident victim from Sunday night was at Mass General being treated for a brain injury. The spokesperson would not identify the patient.

A witness to the scene, who phoned the police after seeing the accident stated, “I’ve never seen a car going so fast on this road,” she continued saying “It’s a dirt road, and it’s really easy to lose control.

This is not the first time a serious accident has occurred on Mile Hill rd., which has no streetlights. On Christmas Eve 2005, two local teenagers were killed driving on the dirt road.

Assignments

The unique structure of assignments in Newswriting has been a challenge so far for me. The way that the assignments are set up, with many smaller assignments rather than one larger one has made is difficult to really keep track of what is due when. Having the blog with step by step instructions has been hugely helpful though. I get to keep a check list of what I have done and what I need to do.

But the biggest challenge for me is the new story every week. I’m already dreading over how I am supposed to find 15 separate stories and do at least 3 interviews for each. I do understand the point of having us do this, to give us a taste of how working as a journalist will be. But with other classes, a job and a social life it becomes hard to keep up with it all.

Assignments

The unique structure of assignments in Newswriting has been a challenge so far for me. The way that the assignments are set up, with many smaller assignments rather than one larger one has made is difficult to really keep track of what is due when. Having the blog with step by step instructions has been hugely helpful though. I get to keep a check list of what I have done and what I need to do.

But the biggest challenge for me is the new story every week. I’m already dreading over how I am supposed to find 15 separate stories and do at least 3 interviews for each. I do understand the point of having us do this, to give us a taste of how working as a journalist will be. But with other classes, a job and a social life it becomes hard to keep up with it all.

Story Idea

I got the idea for my story when I was walking in the MUB, and saw yet another blood drive in the Granite State room. Though there are blood drives very frequently on campus, I still thought of it as newsworthy because of how important donating blood really is.

                According to the red cross website, the one pint taken from your body when you donate is enough blood to save up to three lives! I haven’t been able to give blood for a while, because you can’t for six months after getting a tattoo, but I always try to get my friends to donate.

                I was excited after my interviews because I got to speak with one of the people who deals with and collects the samples. It was a unique opportunity to speak with someone who is behind the scenes of the blood drive.

Writing Leads

A young girl and her sick grandmother survived a vicious attack by a wolf earlier this morning. The incident took place while the girl was on a visit to the grandmother’s house.  

What is news (cont.)

In speaking with other students in the newswriting class, it seemed as though there were to schools of thought on what news is. First, Katie and Chris believed that news is defined by what is actually newsworthy. If something is not important to the masses, it is not news. Chris put it best by saying that “a dog biting a man is not news, but a man biting a dog is.” This meaning that only the exciting and important can be deemed news. This was very different than how I saw the subject. I fell into the second way of thinking of news, shared by Ashley and myself, which is that anything can be news depending on the person. Something that is may be news to one person, may not affect many other people, and vice versa. This shows that news is more of an amorphous, undefinable and ever-changing thing.

What is news?

News is anything and everything in the world that affects us as human beings on a day-to-day basis. From the monumental to the minuscule, anything can be considered news from someone's own unique perspective. Something that may not be considered important or pertinent to one person can change the life of another. Being that news can be any type of information, it can also come from many different types of sources, including print, online, television or even word of mouth. News encompasses all things that can effect the world around us as individuals and as a population as a whole.