Mediawatch - before and after Gabrielle

Our media were in emergency mode yet again this week, offering hours of extra coverage on air, online and in print. Outlets in the hardest-hit places reported the basics - even without access to basics like power, communications and even premises. What will Gabrielle's legacy be for media's role in reporting disasters and national resilience?Our media were in emergency mode yet again this week, offering hours of extra coverage on air, online and in print. Outlets in the hardest-hit places reported the basics - even without access to basics like power, communications and even premises.What will Gabrielle's legacy be for media's role in reporting disasters and national resilience? Listen here"Keep listening to the radio. You guys have done a great job updating people and it's very much appreciated," the Civil Defence Minister Keiran McAnulty told Newstalk ZB's last Sunday afternoon as Gabrielle was just beginning to wreak havoc. Barely two weeks earlier, sudden and catastrophic flooding in and near Auckland caught the media off-guard, but some commentators claimed the heavy warnings about Gabrielle were oppressively ominous - and risked 'crying wolf.'The Newstalk ZB contrarians' conclusions didn't age well. Gabrielle ended up as a national emergency and sparked non-stop rolling news coverage. There were few flat spots on TV and radio, and live online reporting around the clock also give a comprehensive picture - and pictures - of what was going on. It stretched newsrooms to their limits, but news reporters' work was skillfully and selectively supplemented with a steady stream of vivid eyewitness accounts. Tolaga Bay farmer Bridget Parker's description on Nine to Noon of yet another inundation at her place with added forestry slash was among the most confronting (and sweary). Checkpoint's emotional interview on Wednesday with a couple that owned a house in which a friend "disappeared under water" was compelling - but also chilling. RNZ's Kate Green arrived in Gisborne on Monday with the only means of communicating that worked - a satellite phone. "You can't even dial 111. Everything that can break is broken," she told Morning Report listeners, quoting the local mayor. RNZ's Māni Dunlop, who managed to fly in on Tuesday, told listeners that from the air the East Coast looked "buggered." Gisborne is a city and Tairawhiti a region not well covered at the best of times by our national media, which have no bureaux there. It's a bit of an irony that in the worst of times, it was so hard to get the word out. …Go to this episode on rnz.co.nz for more details