MEDIAWATCH: Why was ZB and NZME allowed to endanger so many lives during Cyclone Gabrielle?

Shouldn't hatred towards ZB Hosts now flow like a river breaking its banks in the Hawkes Bay?

By
Martyn Bradbury
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78
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This excruciating take down by RNZ’s Mediawatch as to how ZB hosts downplayed the Cyclone should lead to criminal charges of negligence against NZME…

Radio hosts trivialised commentary on Cyclone Gabrielle as the storm’s destructive path hit New Zealand, Mediawatch says

Cyclone Gabrielle buried homes and took lives, including those of rescuers, this week. But as it bore down on the country, front-rank hosts at Newstalk ZB played down the danger it posed and complained about a day of school closures.

On Sunday afternoon, Newstalk ZB’s Tim Beveridge admonished the media for being what he saw as a bit over-the-top about the threat posed by Cyclone Gabrielle.

“We need to take a breath in the media with our hyperbole and emotive language around it, because I’m not sure that it’s really particularly helpful,” he said. “Privately I just look at some of the coverage and think ‘this is just getting ridiculous’.”

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Just hours after he called the cyclone coverage overblown, Newshub Live at 6’s Karen Rutherford was barely audible over a blustering gale as she crossed live to presenter Laura Tupou from Northland.

Newstalk’s trivialising commentary on Cyclone Gabrielle persisted, even as the storm’s destructive reality swam into focus.

On Monday morning, early morning host Kate Hawkesby decried what she called hysteria from authorities over the cyclone.

After saying she has sympathy with a listener who said the cyclone has been blown out of proportion, she scoffed at the media warning that the storm would be destructive.

“One of the headlines I saw on Newshub was ‘There will be destruction’. That was the headline. If you’ve ever seen anything more anxiety inducing in your life, I don’t know. There will be destruction,” she said.

“They seem convinced it’s coming our way and it’s going to happen so we shall see.”

Later in the show, her husband Mike Hosking came on to add his own derision to the mix.

“What we’ve done is whip ourselves into this extraordinary frenzy,” he said, adding that in Wellington 100km/h winds is just “a breezy day”.

“We panic,” Hawkesby replied. “We’re almost in a state now where we want to be told what to do all the time, and we almost enjoy it where it’s like ‘hunker down, don’t go to school, don’t go to work’. We almost enjoy the panic.”

The pair did go on to concede the possibility of some damage in coastal areas.

Around the same time as Hawkesby and Hosking were guffawing at the “hysterical” reaction to the cyclone and scoffing at the media telling people it would cause destruction, TVNZ Breakfast’s newsreader Chris Chang was informing people of the damage it had already done.

“Cyclone Gabrielle is already causing major disruptions across the North Island,” his bulletin began. “Many homes are without power. Transportation across Auckland has been limited, and many schools have opted to close.”

Over on Newstalk ZB, the hosts continued to poo poo the cyclone’s impact as the day wore on.

On her mid-morning slot, Kerre Woodham lambasted those schools for deciding to close for the day.

“What message does this send to our children? Yet again their education must be sacrificed for the greater good, be it Covid, be it floods, be it cyclones, there are greater priorities than education.”

Her talkback caller Tim couldn’t have agreed more.

“The morons plead it’s for the health and safety of our little poppets,” he said. “What are they going to do next: say that counselling’s available because we know your children will be very anxious about all the water.”

“Thank you Tim,” replied Woodham.

She went on to side with a caller who complained his daughter’s school was closed on Monday and Tuesday in Napier. 

“I was madly refreshing that stupid cyclone app all over the weekend and then I thought ‘what’s the point in doing this’,” she said.

“If it’s going to happen it’s going to happen,” the caller replied.

“Exactly,” Woodham said. “I don’t need to know.”

Napier was one of the hardest hit areas in Cyclone Gabrielle. Homes were destroyed and several people died in the area, including a 2-year-old who was washed away just north of the city.

Despite Woodham’s pronouncement that “nothing has happened” on Monday morning, the headlines on TVNZ’s Midday bulletin immediately after her show ended were quite decisive in saying things were in fact happening.

Jenny Suo led the show with the announcement that 58,000 people were without power across the top of the North Island.

Thousands of those homes without power were in Woodham’s hometown Auckland, with the majority north of Orewa.

The situation was worse in Northland. Nicole Bremner crossed live to the show, standing in front of a growing expanse of floodwater.

“It’s very wet. It’s very cold. People are being asked to stay off the roads. We know there’s a lot of problems with communication. We’re having problems getting people on the phones. We know one of the big cellphone towers is out, and of course there is electricity cuts to homes too,” she said.

Unfortunately some couldn’t watch that informative, responsible reporting from Bremner and the TVNZ team.

People in homes that had lost power could only get the radio – and some were relying on Newstalk ZB for information.

One of Mediawatch’s listeners, who asked to be named only as Jim, said he could only pick up the talk station’s signal at his home in Northland.

He was alarmed to hear its hosts were more focused on Auckland school closures than the escalating flooding, power outages, and dangerous winds people were experiencing in his area.

That obsession with schools persisted into the following day, even as New Zealand woke up to the wreckage left by Gabrielle overnight.

Hawkesby’s editorial early on Tuesday morning once again honed in on school closures.

“So the rain is hitting Auckland city now, but yesterday between 8.30 and 3pm when there was hardly any rain or wind and I wondered why kids in all the unaffected areas couldn’t have been at school,” she said.

“Yesterday turned out to be an average rainy day. Yes I get it, precautions. It’s better to be safe than sorry, but seriously, if this is a pattern of weather we’re going to get more of, then we need to adjust our attitudes to it.”

Twenty minutes later, TVNZ crossed to reporter Tessa Parker, who delivered the news that landslides had destroyed homes and buried people in Muriwai.

“Fire and Emergency has already told us that two houses have collapsed in this coastal suburb this morning, and we understand that people are currently trapped.”

Both of those trapped people – volunteer firefighters Dave van Zwanenberg and Craig Stevens  – died.  

Meanwhile on her Newstalk ZB show, Kerre Woodham relitigated her earlier point about school closures, in esponse to a listener criticising her earlier stance.

“Where areas are affected, they can make their own decisions, and where areas are not affected, they too can make their own. You clearly disagree and that’s fine, but I just don’t believe all of Auckland should be shut down because some suburbs have been terribly affected and some have no and that is the very nature of storms.”

That is the nature of storms, and unless Woodham is sitting on a method of perfectly predicting their path, timing, and intensity, then there’s an argument that it’s better to be safe than sorry.

“They can thrive on contrarianism if they wish but in times of crisis, they have a responsibility to concentrate on clear concise comprehensive information rather than their commercial interests,” former New Zealand Herald editor-in-chief Gavin Ellis told Mediawatch this week. 

“To switch that culture off may be very difficult for (Newstalk ZB) but I think they’ve got to try. By and large the media concentrated very much on what is happening to people and what they need and how can they be helped to recover,” he said.

“I think that those are the imperatives that need to be concentrated on this week and maybe next week. If you’ve got information that can help people, let’s hear about that,” he said.

Our news organisations likely saved lives over the last few days by taking that fact into consideration, informing and warning people about what turned out to be the most destructive cyclone in a century.

In its aftermath they’ve navigated technical challenges to tell the stories of those hit hardest by the disaster.

The Gisborne Herald put out a paper to every house in the city despite not having power in its building.  Newstalk ZB’s NZME stablemate Hawkes Bay Today overcame similar difficulties to put out free editions of its own. Newstalk ZB itself scrambled to broadcast Civil Defence information and news updates in Hawke’s Bay on 96.7FM after its regular FM and AM frequencies were knocked off air.

They all provided a vital public service.

But in a storm that killed people and destroyed homes, some front rank hosts in key time slots at our most popular national talk radio network obsessed about a missed day of school.

Education is a wonderful thing. But perhaps it’s not our students who most need to sit down and take on board some information from people better informed than they are.

RNZ

…the ZB Hosts wanted to play culture war talking point games against the need to take the Cyclone seriously.

They wanted to sell the whole emergency as further proof of the weak Left and their sooky baby trigger levels.

The ZB Hosts played up to these cheap right wing talking points while the Cyclone devoured NZ.

For many caught in the firing line, all they could get was ZB and here was ZB telling them all that there was no danger.

Here is NZME coming out and pretending to be responsible with funds raised for Red Cross, but surely ZB giving out a false narrative about the Cyclone negates that and NZME should be prosecuted for criminal negligence?

They wanted to play up to this right wing myth that the Covid response was a huge over reaction and the Left keep wanting to use fear to bully others into curtailing their freedom!

ZB Hosts were more sexually excited about shitting on the weak panicking about a Cyclone than actually warning people about the worst Cyclone this century.

Cyclone Gabrielle was 960 Hectopascals, that was known before it hit, that knowledge alone tells a person that this was going to be a catastrophic storm if it struck us.

It was more important for ZN Hosts to get off on attacking the ‘fear culture’ of the Left than actually warning people.

Shouldn’t hatred towards ZB Hosts now flow like a river breaking its banks in the Hawkes Bay?

 

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78 COMMENTS

  1. I whole heartedly agree .This was brought up on the National Radio on Sunday and they played extracts of what was said on the radio by these puffed up,idiots. zThe messages they gave out were wrong and as you say people could have died .They should be called to acvount

  2. Hawkesby is an utter light weight who should stick to her level of expertise. The Royal Family. As for Hosking, he’s an insufferable know everything so expecting him to admit he was wrong here just won’t happen. As for the rest of them, they operate in a sad echo chamber of boomer moaning and groaning. They probably need to replace Marcus Lush though as he seems to be the only ZB host with any ability to think critically. Liz Gunn should do nicely.

  3. “Mi Cockskin” and “perma tan Kate” really are the ultimate media channel pests. It appears they are well paid by their masters to basically push a right wing political line, but under the guise of populism.

  4. Hoskings, Hawkesby, and Woodham. Sounds like a firm/partnership dealing in absolutely worthless opinion. At the end of the day that’s all their delusional rantings are. Worthless opinion. Trouble is, somehow this is branded like they have a clue, which couldn’t be further from the truth.

  5. I am uncharacteristically speechless. These dumb broadcasters prioritising their own ignorant opinions over the facts of what was happening out in the broader community should, at the very least be fired, right now. Hugely irresponsible, and possibly a hindrance to others in providing for their own safety and well-being.

  8. This is what you get when the MSM played the fearporn program during CovidCult.

    The boy who cried wolf.

    When there is no trust there is no trust. This is the partisan nature of our current discourse created by Ardern and her enablers.

    Refreshingly it appears Hipkins doesn’t to date want to play this game; That said words are cheap and actions aren’t.

    • Frank the Tank. Hipkins is a real person, not a public relations product or celeb culture wallower, a former school teacher. We got preached at previously by the alleged sole source of truth, but broadcasters should still have been able to ascertain the difference between the two scenarios.

    • Your such a funny bugger, talking about partisan nature when you’re the worst at it who comments here.

      Whale oil and ZB were the instigators of partisan reporting, not the fucking government – it’s odd from the nz right: on one hand labour are useless, next their the worlds best and most effective political actors.

      But I have to say Frank the Tank your utter lack of self awareness is funny as fuck, you make me laugh.

    • The other day Frank you had a great self reflection. You said you needed to wake up ( actually you said “wake me up” but you are asleep either way), You can’t blame the media for Hoskings and Hawkesby being total tossers. That’s what they are, and I would say they are the MSM. This discourse is created by stupid old pricks

    • Ahh the typical right wing pushback. Forget Ardern and Hipkins. This is a about Newstalk ZB gobshites. No ifs or buts and multiple lives lost all the while the arrogance of hosts critically downplaying the warnings based on ignorant right wing ideology.
      Hosking was wrong about John Tamahere’s trust, wrong about not crashing his car and wrong about Gabrielle. It really shows how delusional some are to hang off every word of the Tucker Carlson wannabe.

      • Perfect response Bert. Right on the button as per usual.

        Almost every other commentator above echo pretty much what we all think of Hosking and Hawkesby and I agree with Sylvain above about Hosking not admitting that he was wrong and your commentary about what Hosking has in fact been wrong about.

        Hawkesby actually believes she is important and a celebrity. Oh dear, I guess delusional behaviour is becoming common place amongst some presenters on ZB, including Heather Du Plessis-Allan and her boring husband, who get their support from the right wing unintelligent cabal.

        Now that person Kerre Woodham has joined this despicable duo. What would she know about weather patterns and destruction? I wonder if she and H + H will do a public mea culpa and apologise generally as well as specifically to those people whose lives were destroyed by the big rain and then Cyclone Gabrielle.

        I think my very young school-age nephew’s comment, when I explained to him what this trio had said in a way that he understood, sums it up – “I want to sick on their sandwiches.”

    • I’m really unsure why anyone would listen to them. They are experts in nothing but are sufficiently narcissistic that they can’t recognise this in themselves.

      The experts predicted 960 hPA and multiple weather models predicted the cyclone would track along the eastern coast of the North Island. This in fact is exactly what happened albeit the timing was slightly out. Anyone with half a brain prepares for the worst in this scenario.

      I think the authorities did a reasonable job all things considered although clearly our infrastructure needs attention.

  10. So ZB were complacent and acted like dicks. Now we can choose not to listen to them (a choice I made long ago for other reasons). You should be all for that. And criminal negligence? There would be some serious causation issues with that idea, so calm the farm.

    Another problem is that RNZ has no credibility to be casting these kinds of stones. Shock horror that ZB displayed serious shortcomings. What would a legit Mediawatch find if it ever examined RNZ carefully? The show has been a joke for at least 5 years.

  14. They are trying to be NZ’s Fox News. Bet you that if Paul Holmes was still alive, he would be trying to be Tucker Carlson.

  15. The earlier Auckland deluge was unprecedented and I hadnt experienced rain like it. It is reported that more than 60mm fell in one hour which is about 1 in 50 year event. What made it a 1 in 200 year event was that that same intensity was for a continuous 4 hours – it was unprecedented. It is unlikely we will experience that rainfall again.
    Marcus Lush was amazing sharing information during the storms. This was the most vicious cyclone I have experienced – Bola was similar but not as severe, a Cyclone in the Islands only lasted for 3 hours. When I woke up early in the morning, Tory Tim Beveridge was talking politics. Then that commentary about Hawkesbury and Hosking and Woodham followed with foolish uneducated opinion that ignored the cyclone destruction and was contrary to the TV. They managed to blame Labour for some issues. I was waiting for Jacinda to be blamed for the storm. Are they locked in the TV room with no access to news.
    Right wing radio hosts are generally uneducated especially with scientific and engineering issues and dont ask questions or get qualified person on TV. I note when the right wing found out that the increasing of truck loads from 43 to 57 tons in 2010 by the TORY party caused the potholes and damage to the roads, the discussion was immediately discontinued.
    Tory talk ZB needs raving left wingers on the airwaves to balance the right wing fools whom are promoting hopeless Luxon and dumbo Willis and the tory party..

  19. Absolutely disgraceful, irresponsible and irrelevant highly paid buffoons.Should be discredited and charged for irresponsible broadcasting during a national disaster.

  20. Absolutely disgraceful, irresponsible and irrelevant highly paid buffoons.Should be discredited and charged for irresponsible broadcasting during a national disaster.

  21. Absolutely disgraceful.These overpaid radio celebrities should be charged over putting people’s lives at risk during a national disaster.

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