I would like to briefly discuss the media blackout associated with the Deepwater Horizon oil spill and the resentment BP and the U.S. Government have faced during this event. The spill occurred on April 20, 2010 and was eventually capped on July 15, 2010. During this time news reports suggest the media was restricted in covering certain aspects of the cleanup effort. The video below is from CCN’s Anderson Cooper explaining some of the restrictions the government and BP had imposed on the media.
The following video from CNN shows some of the wildlife cleanup work in the Gulf and how the National Guard and BP security personnel have refused media access to these efforts. One volunteer explained to CNN (off camera) that he signed a document stating he would not talk to the media. Another rescuer told CNN he would be fired if he spoke up about their activities. A BP contract that was initially used to hire rescue and cleanup workers appears to ban any comments to the media. The contract states “Vessel owners and employees will not make news releases, marketing presentations or any other statements…” A BP spokesman told CNN that the company has not enforced this provision in the agreement. However, CNN reports that the workers they talked to have failed to receive that message.
Certainly the lack of information and restriction has drawn much attention from various BP and government constituents. Some of the questions I have concerning the media blackout are: Why the lack of transparency from BP and the government? How is this going to affect future BP relations with its constituencies? Will there be more or less transparency of information and restriction in future incidents of this type? How will this incident affect potential regulations concerning the disseminating of information and media access?
I think this is a terrific example of how not to handle a bad situation. Ever since this first occurred, BP has not been very forthcoming. Instead of sharing what happened and what they were doing to fix things, they kept the public in the dark. However, they wasted no time churning out damage control tv and radio spots talking about how BP is committed to the communities that it serves, etc.
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