I really can’t understand
why authorities are unable to decide who should be the official source when a
disaster-a forest fire in our case-strikes. The lack of decision makes it
difficult to counter criticism as well as to trust the different sources of information,
in a sense that neither the public, nor the media know for certain whether the
information delivered is accurate and trustful.
Since the fire is, according to law, in emergency level 2, it is being
managed by the regional authorities in the Canary Island. Nonetheless, it is
the press manager of the cabildo insular who is monitoring information in
social media through her official account (@KarenBencomoP) without any coordination with the
As @jldecastellvi says in his post , @KarenBencomoP seems to be a new account created because of the fire. Having more than one spokesperson shouldn't be a problem, so long as the information delivered is coordinated and there is a single message. Otherwise, we may have a lot of noise, which can lead to rumour spreading.
I’ve been told that a group of emergency professional, among which are
@jldecastellvi, @LuisSerranoR, Javier Blanco (@tango_alfa2), @GalvezRivas and Mónica
Ojeda (@artebirgo) are thinking of creating a VOST Spain to monitor information
in cases like this.
It sounds to me it a really sensible and great idea. What do you think?
