Just the photo, ma’am
Several witnesses said the aircraft barely left the ground as it attempted to take off on Tuesday afternoon, but smashed through a wall and broke up as it hit shops and houses in the commercial district of Goma. A former pilot, Dunia Sindani, who was among the passengers, told a local radio station that the plane appeared to have had a flat tyre… Julien Paluku, governor of the North Kivu region, where Goma is situated, said one of the plane’s pilots had reported that an engine died as the plane was on the runway. When the pilots tried to brake, a tyre failed as well, he said. [Link]
Today’s Boston Globe ran a spectacular photo of a plane crash in the African country of Congo on page A3, right inside the front page. But the story about the crash (80 on board, at least 40 dead) was buried in the middle of the paper, because Africa does not rate page A3.
The user-filtered news site Reddit had numerous submissions about the tragedy. But the only one which made it to the front page based on upvotes was the photo above showing an African man trying to rescue victims by throwing a rock at the cabin door.
Until India’s economy started growing 8% a year, the only South Asian stories, too, that made front page were news of the weird. Now mixed in with women marrying snakes you see Tatas buying Jaguars.
Africa and South Asia are not in our monkeysphere.
on Wednesday, April 16th, 2008, 7:03 pm in Media, News › 
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What’s most alarming is that the fact that this is reported at all. I guess striking pictures will always get some coverage. Most of the stories coming from the Congo are about wildlife preservation, instead of the horrific and prolonged conflict that’s killed millions there. The second Congo War, 1998-2003, the world’s greatest conflict since World War II, and I didn’t see a single article about it in mainsteam puplications.
Couple of things about the crash -
1. Airlines as DR Congo has one the world’s worst safety records (this is the 5th fatal crash since June 2007)
2. Goma Airport is a “horrible” airport. “Potholes are part of the problem on the runway at Goma airport, which was damaged by lava during a 2002 eruption of a nearby volcano. It is currently in disrepair with broken tarmac all over.The lava flow had reduced the runway by a third and aviation officials said planes now had to make short takeoffs.” As quoted from here
So, would you like to show an airline crash on the front page, esp, when it might communicate the wrong message? (Not that I like the news articles that make it to the first page).
Hmmm…i dunno…I think this is more about print editions versus online media. I first saw this mentioned on the NYT homepage, where it remained for at least a day. Don’t know where it was placed on the hard copy. Telling photo, for sure.