Coverage Thread: Southern California Wildfires

[Jess 1110]

I know we had something in the LA forum, but since the wildfires have spread to the San Diego area I figured it would be more prudent to have something in General.

 

I've been bouncing between stations again - I've been favoring KGTV. KSWB didn't look bad, but I wasn't impressed by KFMB. I'd LIKE to watch KNSD but, well, football. Are they on via Cozi?

 

EDIT: Do any stations chopper share? It looks like KGTV and KSWB do - their choppers seem to be down for refueling at the same time...

[kylephoto760 2]

KNSD switched to Cozi at 4:30 when 39.1 went to football. As of a few moments ago it looks like only KUSI and KGTV are live. Everybody else is back to regular programming from what I can tell. (I'm at work so I can't check Cozi.)

 

Everybody shares Chopper 8 down here. There have been numerous discussions about that over the years around these forums.

[Jess 1110]

KFMB is still at least streaming. KSWB signed off apparently from their stream. Nothing from KNSD.

[A3N 996]

As of 8pm PT

KFMB: live on the CW subchannel.

KNSD: just resumed live coverage on their main channel.

KGTV: is still live,

KSWB: showing FOX programming.

KUSI: Syndicated fare

[Weeters 1812]

Let's try to keep this thread focused on the coverage itself. These threads always end up becoming a list/database of "KXXX signed on at 4:34 and KYYY signed off at 7:30." which doesn't make for good discussion.

 

I don't care WHEN the stations were on. I want to know WHAT they are doing.

[rkolsen 1679]

KNBC closed their newscast with a nice package of their coverage featuring the resilience of their community.

[Jess 1110]

I took a break, dipping back in now. This fire is just wow in the way that it spread. They're saying it's still at 4,100 acres (which is still wow) but given that they keep adding streets to the evac orders every ten minutes it seems, the fire is exploding.

 

I can see why people keep rippi-- I mean, being inspired by the Scripps graphics. They're certainly more elegant than the other stations' graphics. The only thing that bugs me is the useless box at the left but other than that they're excellent.

 

Staying on graphics for a bit, the KNSD graphics engine fell down and went boom when I was watching them earlier. This was when they shoved the picture aside to show one of those inset graphics, so after all the graphics suddenly vanished they had a big black bar on the side for a good minute until they fixed it. I gotta say, I love NBC Arthouse and I love their graphics output, but they bit off more than they could chew with Look N.

 

It's weird that four stations share a chopper, yet the one station gets to have their own reporter aboard. At least only KFMB pretends the chopper is there, the other stations just vaguely refer to "the news chopper" or "aerial shots". The CBS/Fox (heh) pool here uses their own brands for the same chopper.

[rkolsen 1679]

Staying on graphics for a bit, the KNSD graphics engine fell down and went boom when I was watching them earlier. This was when they shoved the picture aside to show one of those inset graphics, so after all the graphics suddenly vanished they had a big black bar on the side for a good minute until they fixed it. I gotta say, I love NBC Arthouse and I love their graphics output, but they bit off more than they could chew with Look N.

 

Were you talking about one of those picture in picture style graphics? Like where the anchor is on the left frame and there’s a larger video frame (even KNBC’s annoying habit of a car chase where they have two different sized boxes during a car chase in the upper left hand corner is the live feed but the larger box is annoying replay)? Or the area where an OTS text element was missing.

 

I’m not sure if it’s the graphics engine but rather a operator error running OverDrive. KNSD is there second newest build out and hopefully they got modern Chyron boxes. I could see them repurposing the graphics boxes under GE but with the Comcast investment I can’t see them install equipment that will soon be outdated or unable to handle their requirements. I mean when WCAU went HD didn’t they upconvert their graphics from SD?

[Phil Konstantin 11]

I took a break, dipping back in now. This fire is just wow in the way that it spread. They're saying it's still at 4,100 acres (which is still wow) but given that they keep adding streets to the evac orders every ten minutes it seems, the fire is exploding.

 

I can see why people keep rippi-- I mean, being inspired by the Scripps graphics. They're certainly more elegant than the other stations' graphics. The only thing that bugs me is the useless box at the left but other than that they're excellent.

 

Staying on graphics for a bit, the KNSD graphics engine fell down and went boom when I was watching them earlier. This was when they shoved the picture aside to show one of those inset graphics, so after all the graphics suddenly vanished they had a big black bar on the side for a good minute until they fixed it. I gotta say, I love NBC Arthouse and I love their graphics output, but they bit off more than they could chew with Look N.

 

It's weird that four stations share a chopper, yet the one station gets to have their own reporter aboard. At least only KFMB pretends the chopper is there, the other stations just vaguely refer to "the news chopper" or "aerial shots". The CBS/Fox (heh) pool here uses their own brands for the same chopper.

 

There has only been one TV helicopter in San Diego since around January 2013. I was the reporter for Sky 10 until then. A few months later, I went over to Chopper 8, which is the only remaining helicopter. Several of the stations still refer to the copter as their own. The deal was managed by KFMB, that's why they are the only one to get the voice of the reporter on-board.

Phil Konstantin

[A3N 996]

I'm curious to see what the plan is for Friday's coverage. With only one chopper available, they'll be very limited. During the 2003/2007 wildfires, KGTV/KFMB/KNSD took turns rotating their choppers so that they had no gap in aerial coverage.

 

Not to mention that KFMB is stretched thin with a few absentee talent, and the fact that they can't rely on outside help for coverage.

[rkolsen 1679]

KNBC has been using this looping backdrop for their videowall showing what appears to be a news chopper filming the fires. What are the odds this was one of their News Chopper 4s or a competitors? It certainly is a dramatic sight.

 

 

Also during Nightly News last night Miguel Almageur’s package on the fire included some b-roll of KNBC’s helicopter. Just for a few seconds. Seemed like some self promotion.

 

But hey Jeff Glor was up in one of the helicopters doing a package.

[C Block 1489]

I'm pretty sure KNBC has two choppers anyway.

[TheRob 920]

I watched a lot of KSWB Thursday while working. At the beginning, they had a single photog with a Dejero, doing the reporting, and putting out fires with his own feet. After a few hours, KSWB was rotating between two ground reporters and a helicopter shot.

 

Fallbrook is where my brother got married and where his father-in-law lives. There are few roads and limited access for both firefighters and media. Cell service is spotty at best.

[mre29 1343]

[ATTACH=full]4866[/ATTACH]

 

It looks like their studio is in hell.

[ColumbusNewsFan 217]

It looks like their studio is in hell.

 

There is a really bad joke there that I REALLY want to make but I don't have the skills of Eat News to pull it off.

[rkolsen 1679]

Are the LA and SD stations back to normally scheduled broadcasts? I haven’t gotten many push alerts for live coverage lately.

 

With the wildfires still raging what’s the point that stations call off breaking news coverage -when evacuations are lifted?

[A3N 996]

Are the LA and SD stations back to normally scheduled broadcasts? I haven’t gotten many push alerts for live coverage lately.

 

With the wildfires still raging what’s the point that stations call off breaking news coverage -when evacuations are lifted?

Yeah, they went back to regular programming. The thing is that coverage was subpar on all stations. KUSI and KSWB waited too long to break in on Thursday, and even though they had several hours of non-stop coverage, by 8 pm they were off while KGTV - much to their credit, continued on. KFMB as well.

 

Keep in mind that the fire is only 20% contained and winds are expected to pick up sometime today.

[ColDayNews 437]

Have any of the networks broken into programming for a national update on the situation?

[C Block 1489]

With the wildfires still raging what’s the point that stations call off breaking news coverage -when evacuations are lifted?

 

Wall-to-wall is definitely needed when the fire is new and if it's destroying a good number of homes. Firefighters always do everything they can to protect populated areas first even if it means the fire continues to grow and envelop more forested land. Wall-to-wall isn't necessary so long as the fire isn't eating away at houses at a fast pace, though fires can definitely take up entire shows.

 

I don't really get the criticism on here that the California stations aren't doing a good job covering these fires because they're not wall-to-wall all the time or not doing continuous live coverage overnight. These fires are unprecedented and exhausting to cover. Trying to get reporters and photogs live at these things is a challenge in and of itself. The active frontlines are usually not in good cell service range, and the satellite time has been booking up fast. The choppers have great video, but they also need downtime to refuel, which can take a while.

 

Cal Fire usually does a handful of press conferences at the same times each day. Aside from plugging in the latest numbers from them, what else is there to really cover other than to talk to more PIOs, bring in the weather guy to drone on about winds, and have reporters get the inevitably moving-yet-somewhat predictable sound of a family that lost everything?