You will see shots on TV of Charleston flooding on a full moon high tide without rain or a storm! If the camera man turned around in a circle, he would capture high and dry behind him most of the time. It's the Lowcountry and the Battery is partly built on fill and former creeks & marsh. The City Market is also often shown on TV as being flooded. It was built on a former creek that was filled way back. There's usually only a small area now that floods in the market area as the city has done some work in the area. It recedes quickly too. But that doesn't stop the media from filming that section and leaving the impression that it's worse than it is. Ratings, I guess, and a lot of time to fill on air. That's not to say that we aren't flooding more often and in areas we haven't before. It seems as if the city fixes one area and the water moves to another. I think I read that, at that time, there were 150 applications for permits to raise historic houses. We're going to see more of that.
Thanks for the clarification. I did know that he was referring to the whole of the Bahamas. Should have re-read it as to the title. To me, he seemed to talk more of what didn't happen than what did. Not the best way to enlist help, IMO.
Thanks, Glynda. Glad to hear the flooding is more limited than it sometimes seems on TV and that you seem to be doing just fine. Ever since 9/11 when they showed a group of people in a Middle Eastern refugee camp celebrating on the collapse of the World Trade Center buildings and showed "everyone" wearing masks in Toronto during the SARS crisis in 2003, I have taken such reports with a large grain of salt until I can do my own corroboration from more local sources.
It turned out that several other journalists on the scene in the camp at the time, later said it was just a small group of maybe 50 or so radicals that were celebrating at one single intersection of the camp, knowing the American cameras were there. If they had just panned back it would have been more obvious that no one else was celebrating in the massive camp!
And with respect to the SARS issue, I was shocked at the time by the reporting, because the only place I had seen masks on anyone here in Toronto during the crisis was for those taking a break outside the two hospitals where they were actually treating SARS patients. But the media blew it all out of proportion and it actually caused a decline in tourism that summer. It is one of the reasons why many news media generally do not always have the best reputation these days, even some of the old standbys. The old news departments were quite different, IMO, such as CBS in the era of people like Walter Cronkite. Today it seems to be much more about "sound" and "video" bites and the eternal race for ratings shares. Very little in-depth reporting and very sad, IMO.
With respect to the Bahamian PM, I suspect his motive behind putting a good face on the crisis has a lot to do with tourism. Unlike places like Toronto, which has a very broad economy and can easily withstand a short-term reduction in tourism, that is not the case with many Caribbean nations. They depend upon tourism to drive just about everything in their economies. So he was probably trying to walk the fine line between letting the world know how desperately they need help for those areas hit by Dorian, while still encouraging tourists to visit the areas not affected and not to cancel their plans.
For those tourists that already had bookings in places like Andros, Nassau and the Eleuthras, they needed to let them know that things were fine and Nassau airport and their hosts were ready and waiting for them. I have already seen appeals from the Bahamas for people to help support their recovery efforts by not cancelling if they are staying somewhere other than Grand Bahama or the Abacos. They are encouraging others to "come on down" and help support everyone by visiting and leaving behind their hard currencies.
