HURRICANE GUSTAV MISSES NEW ORLEANS, NETWORKS MISS RATINGS GOALS
September 1 2008
Atlanta, GA – While residents of New Orleans are breathing a major sigh of relief that the brunt of Hurricane Gustav bypassed the cities, the twenty-four news networks are lamenting the loss of the biggest news story of the month.
Amongst the biggest losers in the coverage are Fox News, CNN, and MSNBC. All three networks dedicated significant airtime leading up to the storm, as well as having put a substantial effort and investment towards embedding reporters in the apparent path of the storm, all to no avail.
“We were able to gain a very healthy share in the two days leading up to landfall,” said a spokesperson for CNN. “But since the storm sort of veered left, so did the viewership. I can’t speak for the other networks, but we went all out for this. We put Anderson (Cooper) out there, you didn’t see Fox putting their top tier stars in harm’s way, but we did. It’s a big disappointment to be sure, but everyone is safe so that’s a good thing, I guess.”
Rival Fox News was in a similar predicament and coupled with the drama of the downsizing of the Republican Convention, has seen a significant hit to their ratings.
“It was the perfect storm for us, so to speak,” said a spokesperson for the network. “Labour Day, Gustav, and the reduced RNC; all those things collided to hurt us pretty significantly. Ratings usually dip for the long weekend, but with our viewership we thought everything would be okay because of the convention. Then the Hurricane, and we were all kind of giddy, but everything is just kind of muted now. Hopefully our advertisers will see that it was just a blip.”
MSNBC had no comment on the particulars of the situation, citing their lack of real ratings against the other two networks. “It’s hard for us to measure a ratings drop to be honest, we have very limited data to work with.
The big two have already enabled a plan to recoup from their losses, with reporting of minor flooding through some parts of New Orleans and overflowing swimming pools throughout the state. 
“It’s the objective of any news organization to present the news,” continued CNN. “And we will present every single last detail we can think of as long as there is a possible audience out there. If it comes down to stories about people who left their car windows down, we will report it as long as people are interested.”
Fox is working along similar lines, though relieved that the Republican Convention will go off. “We are in the ratings business. I mean we report news, but it’s still a business first and ratings are directly tied to that. We have to be responsible to our advertisers and will report anything that we feel people may want to watch. I’m just glad we have weathered this particular storm, our reviews are coming up.”
Mike Michaels, American Correspondent
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