Breaking news
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- "Special Report" redirects here. For the Fox News program, see Special Report with Brit Hume
Breaking news is an interruption of scheduled programming in order to report the latest details of a current event.
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[edit] Format
The format of a special report or breaking news even commonly consists of an opening graphic, featuring music which adds an emphasis on the importance of the event. This is usually followed with the introduction of a news anchor, who welcomes the viewer to the broadcast and introduces the story at hand.
Once the story is introduced, the network may choose to continue to show a live shot of the anchor or may cut away to video or images of the story that is being followed during the broadcast. Additionally, the coverage may be passed to a reporter at the location of the breaking event, possibly sharing more information about the story as it breaks.
Depending upon the story being followed, the report may last only a few minutes, or continue for multiple hours at a time. If coverage continues for an extended amount of time, the network may integrate analysis about the story through analysts in-studio, via. phone, satellite, or through other means of communication.
When the coverage comes to a close, the network (depending upon being a news channel or a regular broadcast station) may thank the viewers for watching, resuming programming that was occurring prior to the event or begin new programming, depending upon the amount of time spent on the coverage.
[edit] Usage
Although broadcast stations vary, the introduction of 24 hour news channels has brought about an era where those channels are able to break into coverage at any time, commonly having someone available at any time to anchor a breaking story. Some networks, such as Sky News, largely emphasize this, even advertising the station as being first for breaking news.
[edit] Criticism
When a network begins coverage of a breaking story, the early details about the stories are commonly sketchy, commonly due to the limited amount of resources available to the reporters for information during the time the story initially breaks. An example of this occurring was during the Sago Mine disaster, in which the initial reports were that the 12 miners were found alive, but the network later found out that only 1 actually survived.
Another criticism has been the diluting of the importance of breaking news by the need of 24-hour news channels to fill time, using the title when covering any number of soft news stores, one example being car chases.
[edit] See also
