One tragedy after another

Wow.  Just wow.

Three major transport accidents in a single day.

The major newsmaker was the crash of the 777 at San Francisco airport.  I'm absolutely amazed that only two people died in the accident.  The video of the crash looked horrendous, but somehow the flight crew got the vast majority of the passengers out of the jet and away from danger.  One has to feel very sad about the two young women who lost their lives, and the numerous injured passengers (some severely so) who couldn't walk away from the crash.  And yet, it boggles the mind how many escaped.  I have flown on a 777 a couple of times, and I was very impressed with the plane in every way.  From the news reports, though, I found out that the plane was designed so that all passengers could be evacuated from the plane in 90 seconds, even if half of the exits were unusable.  That's truly incredible.  Who could imagine such a thing even ten years ago?  A jumbo jet crashes at SFO and most people walk away.

Another thing that amazes me, though, is how a couple of other tragedies fell by the wayside, and received much less attention from the news media.  The first was a train that crashed in Canada.  A train carrying crude oil rolled down a hill from a parking spot, jumped the track and crashed into a town.  A town!!  Forty people are missing, and a number of buildings were destroyed.  This received far less coverage than the plane crash, but the actual damage appears to be much greater.  Is it because it took place in Quebec?

How about the plane crash in Alaska, which killed all ten people on board?  It isn't even on MSNBC's front page!  Is it because the crash that killed five times more people wasn't as dramatic?  At least the media is staying on top of the violence in Egypt, where over 50 are dead.  But still ...

I'm not sure where I'm going with this.  I guess I just wonder where drama goes away, and real news begins.  I don't care about a Kardashian baby, or if the tanning mom is in rehab, or if Lindsay Lohan snorts all-purpose flour.  I really don't.  And yet, the news media continues to put drivel out there as "news".

Even though watching the news on BBC America is far more depressing, at least I get the feeling that I am watching real news, and that the viewpoint is somewhat balanced.  Stop showing the SFO crash fifty times an hour!  Tell me what is going on, leave the Fox News / NPR / Al Jazeera preaching out of it, and give me facts.  Don't tell me what I should think.  Sure, you can tell me the various viewpoints on a story, but let me decide how I feel about it.  And let me know that there is more going on than a crash in SF.

Condolences to all affected by these horrible events...