How 2022's best extreme weather segments point the way forward for national TV news' extreme weather coverage
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Much of 2022’s extreme weather coverage from national TV news outlets failed to connect the consequences of climate-driven events such as wildfires, hurricanes, heat waves, and megadroughts to their primary cause: global warming induced primarily by the burning of fossil fuels. Corporate broadcast and cable TV news reporting on extreme weather events in 2022 too often neglected to connect these disasters to the climate crisis, allowed systemic failures that are exposed by extreme climate events to go unchallenged, and failed to demand accountability for those exacerbating climate change, as well as its impacts and injustices.
A roundup of this year’s extreme weather coverage found that national TV news shows mentioned climate change in only 17% of segments about mid-June’s multiple concurrent extreme weather events, while broadcast and cable coverage of Yosemite National Park’s Washburn Fire from July 9-11 mentioned climate change in just 37% of segments. Similarly, only 32% of national TV news segments about the global extreme heat waves from July 16-18 mentioned climate change.
During broadcast and cable news coverage of a record-breaking heat dome that afflicted the American West from late-August through early-September, climate change was mentioned in only 12% of segments. And, from August 25 through September 15, national TV news coverage of Pakistan’s catastrophic floods mentioned climate change in 35 of 78 segments.
Moving into hurricane season, broadcast and cable news coverage of Hurricane Fiona from September 14-20 mentioned climate change in only 7 out of 233 segments, while national TV news coverage of Hurricane Ian mentioned climate only 46 times across 1,020 segments.
There were some notable positive examples among 2022’s extreme weather segments, however, which contextualized the role of climate change, amplified voices from vulnerable communities, and demanded accountability for the polluting industries driving the climate crisis. As such, they should serve as a model for how broadcast and cable news shows should approach their coverage of extreme weather in 2023 and going forward.