News Story and X Post

News Story and X Post

A family of three was admitted to Hillcrest Hospital following a fire that broke out at the Henderson family home in Oak Tree Heights, located in Boston, on the dawn of Monday.

According to the Boston Fire Department, they were called to the Oak Tree Heights address at 5.00 a.m. by a neighbor who observed smoke from the home. Responding crews arrived at the home at 5.07 a.m. and secured the Henderson family, who were already on the opposite street, before proceeding to put out the fire.

It took the fire department exactly two hours to completely extinguish the flames from Henderson’s home, even though everything was lost. The family was concerned about their dog, a yellow lab and collie mix, who ran from the fire but was yet to be found by the time of writing this report.

A worrying trend that has bothered the fire department is that alarms continue to be reported as having failed in recent fire incidents. At Henderson’s home, for instance, the family reported not having heard the alarm system.

Of the ten fire incidents reported within the past six months, smoke alarms were found to be either dysfunctional or unavailable. Worryingly, three deaths and seven serious injuries were documented from these fire incidents, raising concerns about safety awareness. As a result, the Boston Fire Department has been conducting free fire safety lessons open to all members of the community.

Apart from the emotional anguish that has been associated with fire accidents due to injuries and loss of lives, such fires lead to families losing cherished possessions. James Henderson was concerned about the memories lost as the fire consumed their family photos.

Henderson remains grateful that they all made it out alive and unhurt, considering the fire broke out at an odd hour when they were fast asleep. A GoFundMe account was created to support the family in recovering lost possessions.

Word Count: 317

X (Twitter) Post

A Boston family survives a horrible inferno as the Boston Fire Department raises the alarm about a growing trend of dysfunctional smoke alarms. The fire department rallies residents to engage alarm technicians who will verify if their alarm systems are effective.

#FireSafety

ORDER A PLAGIARISM-FREE PAPER HERE

We’ll write everything from scratch

News Story and X Post

Overview

This assignment will test your performance in news style writing, taken from Rich’s text and covering use of the Associated Press (AP) Stylebook.

News Story and X Post

Instructions

Write a 300-word News Story using the provided Fire Fact Sheet and the Inverted Pyramid Checklist.  Write the story as if the incident has just occurred and you are a local news reporter. You should only use facts and information provided in the Fire Fact Sheet. You must demonstrate principles from your reading in the Rich text to compose your story.

Once you have composed your story, create an X (formerly Twitter) message to promote the story. Include it at the bottom of the News Story. Be sure to create and include a hashtag for the X post. X allows 280 characters (vs 140 previously). See the tips in Chapter 3 for effective posts.

Inverted Pyramid Structure

Use the inverted pyramid structure for your story. Remember, the inverted pyramid style means that the most important information comes first and is followed by paragraphs arranged in descending order of importance. See Chapters 2 and 9 in Rich’s text.

Develop a good, strong, concise lead using Rich’s guidelines (Chapter 2). Remember, as a reporter, you must make a judgment about what to put in the lead on the basis of the information provided in the Fire Fact Sheet.

Develop the following paragraphs that embody the next most important information. The body will provide more information, supporting evidence, context, and illumination in the form of more details, direct and indirect quotes, and other descriptions.

Fairness and Accuracy

Make sure your reporting is fair and balanced. Suspend your judgment and do not draw conclusions from the facts provided. You must speak to the facts.

Transitions

Use transitions to help get the reader from one point to another smoothly.  See Chapter 8 in Rich’s text for tips.

Fairness and Accuracy

Make sure your reporting is fair and balanced. Show more than one side of the story.  Suspend your judgment and do not draw conclusions from the facts provided. You must speak to the facts. Make sure that names are spelled correctly. Be sure to identify dates and record locations correctly.

 Correct your own Story

See the checklist on page 142 in Rich’s text to revise and correct your own work for solid writing.

X (formerly Twitter) Post

X allows 280 characters, versus the 140 it allowed previously. It is still important to write like a headline: strongest words at the beginning, strong verbs, cut words such as “and” and “the.” Hashtags are used to generate conversation around a topic and congregate voices and information. Your hashtag should be useable and unique to your story.

Format

Use Times New Roman 12 pt. font, 1.5 line spacing and include a word count at the end.

This assignment is due by 11:59 p.m. (ET) on Monday of Module/Week 3.