The Backstep Firefighter made a post yesterday titled PR DILEMA:BUFFALO. The post, with video, is about a house fire in Buffalo, the department’s perception of how it was fighting the fire and a neighbor’s perception of lack of effort to get water on the job.
Backstep Firefighter concluded the post with these questions -
Do our public relations go far enough in explaining what we do?
Are our usual messages too technical?
Yesterday evening we trekked out to the Suffolk County Fire Academy for a drill. The “Tower” is a facsimile of a commercial office building. I always liked this drill since in my town we have very few commercial buildings and this is our one opportunity each year to hone our skills and learn new techniques in attacking a fire in this type of structure.
Normally, as PIO, I am tasked with taking pictures and video of the drill to post online and use for internal purposes. It has been a few years since I have had the chance to do an actual hands on evolution of the Tower.
We were a little short handed on the line officer end when we left the firehouse with an Engine and Ladder. I jumped into the officer’s seat on Engine 3 to head out to the Academy.
In one of my other lives I am the lead broadcaster for Verizon Fios cable coverage of the NASCAR races at Long Island’s Riverhead Raceway. The weekly production is a “production.” A crew of around 10 toils for a good part of the afternoon to get the cables, cameras, monitors, microphones, headsets and electronic equipment in place to make things hum during the evening boradcast.
This past Saturday a racing fan with a small Flip HD video camera came up to me with a request. This woman asked me if it was permissible to video some of the racing action. She told me her son was a frequent visitor to the track and is now in the Army stationed at Fort Jackson. She felt this would be a taste of home for him. I told her it was fine and she proceeded to take her seat in the grandstand with a bunch of family members.
While we worked our way through the Verizon broadcast I noticed this woman shooting the races, interviewing family members for her son, interviewing drivers who went to sit in the grandstand after they raced.
This woman was virtually able to do with a $150 camera what it took two announcers, a 10 man crew and tend of thousands of dollars in equipment to accomplish.
Every profession has their own jargon. If we can use “deuce and a half,” set of irons,” “knock down” and “job” why can’t television newsrooms use “VOSOT” and “VOSOTVO?”
We all deal with television reporters at major incident scenes. As much as we employ our own internal jargon on the fire ground, they have their own secret language that we hear all the time. To be more media savvy it is important that we understand how they are going about their jobs.
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