Some Miami Stations Cover Car Chase, Some Don't

The blog SFL TV was surfing the Miami TV universe during an A.C. Cowlings-esque high speed car chase covering three counties today, and gives WFOR and WSVN high marks for their coverage. SFL TV wasn’t so enthused about WTVJ and WPLG, which he says stuck with soap operas.

SFL writes:

Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t the basic duty of  local news station’s to keep the public informed, safe, and out of harms way? WSVN broke into regularly scheduled programing to do just that; as did WFOR.   This pursuit wasn’t a short chase. It went on for nearly a half-an-hour, gaining national coverage on cable news stations, and other affiliates across the nation. Yet there was no mention of it on NBC6 or Local 10, both on-air and online. Local 10’s site, which claims to be “Just News,” didn’t have a mention of it until the chase was over. As for the joke called “NBCMiami.com,” nearly 30 minutes after the chase ended, there’s still no mention of it. 

SFL has a poll asking readers who was right: the two stations that covered the chase live, or the two that stuck with scheduled programming.

Writes one user: If two local stations are already covering a story, then WTVJ and WPLG made the right decision. In my opinion, 4 local stations all carrying the same story is 3 stations too much.

We’ve been poking around the Miami TV market for an upcoming Market Eye profile about DMA #17. Lots of interesting players in the market: an NBC and CBS O&O, Ed Ansin’s WSVN, Post-Newsweek’s WPLG (P.N. nearly acquired WTVJ around this time last year), and some super-strong Spanish-language stations, including Univision’s WLTV.