Great Blue Hill eruption prank

Last updated

On April 1, 1980, WNAC-TV aired a fake news bulletin that stated that Great Blue Hill was erupting. Intended as an April Fools' prank, it resulted in panic in Milton, Massachusetts, and the surrounding area.

Contents

News report

WNAC-TV ended its 6 pm news broadcast with a bulletin reporting that Great Blue Hill in Milton had erupted and was spraying lava and ash onto nearby homes. The report showed footage of lava flowing down a hillside (taken from the March 27 eruption of Mount St. Helens) and edited remarks from President Jimmy Carter (who expressed concern) and Governor Edward J. King (who called the situation "serious"). According to reporter Jan Harrison, the disaster had been caused by a geological chain reaction set off by the eruption of Mount St. Helens a week earlier. At the end of the bulletin, Harrison held up a card that read "April Fools!". [1] [2] [3]

Reaction

Following the report, some Milton residents began to flee their homes. [1] [4] The Milton Police Department received over a hundred calls from people who believed that the report was true. [5] The Massachusetts Department of Civil Defense was also inundated with calls from residents who wanted to know if they should evacuate their homes. [6]

WNAC-TV received dozens of calls from angry viewers. The station issued an apology during its 11 pm newscast. [5] The next day, the executive producer of the 6 o'clock news, Homer Cilley, was fired by the station for "his failure to exercise good news judgment" and for violating the Federal Communications Commission's rules about showing stock footage without identifying it as such. [3] [4] [6]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mount St. Helens</span> Volcano in Skamania County, Washington, U.S.

Mount St. Helens is an active stratovolcano located in Skamania County, Washington, in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It lies 52 miles (83 km) northeast of Portland, Oregon, and 98 miles (158 km) south of Seattle. Mount St. Helens takes its English name from that of the British diplomat Lord St Helens, a friend of explorer George Vancouver who surveyed the area in the late 18th century. The volcano is part of the Cascade Volcanic Arc, a segment of the Pacific Ring of Fire.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mount Etna</span> Active stratovolcano on the east coast of Sicily, Italy

Mount Etna, or simply Etna, is an active stratovolcano on the east coast of Sicily, Italy, in the Metropolitan City of Catania, between the cities of Messina and Catania. It lies above the convergent plate margin between the African Plate and the Eurasian Plate. It is one of the tallest active volcanoes in Europe, and the tallest peak in Italy south of the Alps with a current height of 3,357 m (11,014 ft), though this varies with summit eruptions. Over a six-month period in 2021, Etna erupted so much volcanic material that its height increased by approximately 100 ft (30 m), and the southeastern crater is now the tallest part of the volcano.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mayon</span> Volcano in the Philippines

Mayon, also known as Mount Mayon and Mayon Volcano, is an active stratovolcano in the province of Albay in Bicol, Philippines. A popular tourist spot, it is renowned for its "perfect cone" because of its symmetric conical shape, and is regarded as very sacred in Philippine mythology.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lassen Volcanic National Park</span> National park in California, United States

Lassen Volcanic National Park is an American national park in northeastern California. The dominant feature of the park is Lassen Peak, the largest plug dome volcano in the world and the southernmost volcano in the Cascade Range. Lassen Volcanic National Park is one of the few areas in the world where all four types of volcano can be found—plug dome, shield, cinder cone, and stratovolcano.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mount Nyiragongo</span> Active volcano in the Democratic Republic of the Congo

Mount Nyiragongo is an active stratovolcano with an elevation of 3,470 m (11,385 ft) in the Virunga Mountains associated with the Albertine Rift. It is located inside Virunga National Park, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, about 12 km (7.5 mi) north of the town of Goma and Lake Kivu and just west of the border with Rwanda. The main crater is about two kilometres (1 mi) wide and usually contains a lava lake. The crater presently has two distinct cooled lava benches within the crater walls – one at about 3,175 m (10,417 ft) and a lower one at about 2,975 m (9,760 ft).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Spaghetti-tree hoax</span> 1957 April Fools hoax report broadcast on BBC

The spaghetti-tree hoax was a three-minute hoax report broadcast on April Fools' Day 1957 by the BBC current-affairs programme Panorama, purportedly showing a family in southern Switzerland harvesting spaghetti from the family "spaghetti tree". At the time spaghetti was relatively unknown in the UK, so many British people were unaware that it is made from wheat flour and water; a number of viewers afterwards contacted the BBC for advice on growing their own spaghetti trees. Decades later, CNN called this broadcast "the biggest hoax that any reputable news establishment ever pulled".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens</span> Major volcanic eruption in Skamania County, Washington, U.S.

On March 27, 1980, a series of volcanic explosions and pyroclastic flows began at Mount St. Helens in Skamania County, Washington, United States. A series of phreatic blasts occurred from the summit and escalated until a major explosive eruption took place on May 18, 1980, at 8:32 AM. The eruption, which had a Volcanic Explosivity Index of 5, was the most significant to occur in the contiguous United States since the much smaller 1915 eruption of Lassen Peak in California. It has often been declared the most disastrous volcanic eruption in U.S. history.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mount St. Helens National Volcanic Monument</span> Government-protected area in the United States

Mount St. Helens National Volcanic Monument is a U.S. National Monument that includes the area around Mount St. Helens in Washington. It was established on August 27, 1982, by U.S. President Ronald Reagan, following the 1980 eruption. The 110,000 acre (445 km2) National Volcanic Monument was set aside for research, recreation, and education. Inside the monument, the environment is left to respond naturally to the disturbance. It was the third national monument to be managed by the U.S. Forest Service.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Harry Glicken</span> American geologist and volcanologist

Harry Glicken was an American volcanologist. He researched Mount St. Helens in the United States before and after its 1980 eruption, and was very distraught about the death of volcanologist David A. Johnston, who was Glicken's mentor and supervisor in Spring 1980 at Mount St. Helens. Glicken was initially assigned to the USGS observation post in the weeks leading up to the eruption but was called away the night before the eruption.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kelud</span> Stratovolcano in East Java, Indonesia.

The Kelud is an mountain stratovolcano located in Kediri, East Java, Indonesia. Like many Indonesian volcanoes and others on the Pacific Ring of Fire, Kelud is known for large explosive eruptions throughout its history. More than 30 eruptions have occurred since 1000 AD. In 2007, an effusive explosion filled the crater with a lava dome. It last erupted on 13 February 2014, destroying the lava dome and ejecting boulders, stones and ashes up to West Java about 500 kilometres (310 mi) from Mount Kelud. The crater filled with water during the rainy season.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mount Edgecumbe (Alaska)</span> Mountain in Alaska, United States

Mount Edgecumbe is located at the southern end of Kruzof Island, Alaska, about 15 miles (24 km) west of Sitka. The dormant volcano is about 9.9 miles (16 km) east of the Queen Charlotte Fault that separates the North American and Pacific Plates, and is the highest point in the Mount Edgecumbe volcanic field, an area of about 100 square miles (260 km2) on Kruzof Island that also includes Crater Ridge and Shell Mountain.

Charles Bishop Scarborough III is an American television journalist and author. Since 1974, he has been the lead news anchor at WNBC, the New York City flagship station of the NBC Television Network, and has also appeared on NBC News. He currently anchors News 4 New York at 6 p.m. every weeknight.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Great Blue Hill</span> Large hill near Boston, Massachusetts, United States

Great Blue Hill is a hill of 635 feet located within the Blue Hills Reservation in Milton, Randolph and Canton, Massachusetts, about 10 miles (16 km) south of downtown Boston. It is the highest point in Norfolk County and the Greater Boston area.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mount Sinabung</span> Active volcano in North Sumatra, Indonesia

Mount Sinabung is a Pleistocene-to-Holocene stratovolcano of andesite and dacite in the Karo plateau of Karo Regency, North Sumatra, Indonesia, 40 kilometres (25 mi) from the Lake Toba supervolcano. Many old lava flows are on its flanks and the last known eruption, before recent times, occurred 1200 years before present, between 740 - 880 CE. Solfataric activities were last observed at the summit in 1912; recent documented events include an eruption in the early hours of 29 August 2010 and eruptions in September and November 2013, January, February and October 2014. The volcano has recently claimed the life of at least 23 people in a number of events since 2014. Between 2013 and 2014, the alert for a major event was increased with no significant activity. On 2 June 2015, the alert was again increased, and on 26 June 2015, at least 10,000 people were evacuated, fearing a major eruption. The long eruption of Mount Sinabung is similar to that of Mount Unzen in Japan, which erupted for five years after lying dormant for 400 years. A major eruption began on 10 August 2020.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cascade Volcanoes</span> Chain of stratovolcanoes in western North America

The Cascade Volcanoes are a number of volcanoes in a volcanic arc in western North America, extending from southwestern British Columbia through Washington and Oregon to Northern California, a distance of well over 700 miles (1,100 km). The arc formed due to subduction along the Cascadia subduction zone. Although taking its name from the Cascade Range, this term is a geologic grouping rather than a geographic one, and the Cascade Volcanoes extend north into the Coast Mountains, past the Fraser River which is the northward limit of the Cascade Range proper.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Types of volcanic eruptions</span> Overview of different types of volcanic eruptions

Several types of volcanic eruptions—during which lava, tephra, and assorted gases are expelled from a volcanic vent or fissure—have been distinguished by volcanologists. These are often named after famous volcanoes where that type of behavior has been observed. Some volcanoes may exhibit only one characteristic type of eruption during a period of activity, while others may display an entire sequence of types all in one eruptive series.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">April Fools' Day</span> Annual celebration on April 1st

April Fools' Day or All Fools' Day is an annual custom on April 1st consisting of practical jokes and hoaxes. Jokesters often expose their actions by shouting "April Fools!" at the recipient. Mass media can be involved with these pranks, which may be revealed as such the following day. The custom of setting aside a day for playing harmless pranks upon one's neighbour has been relatively common in the world historically.

A media prank is a type of media event, perpetrated by staged speeches, activities, or press releases, designed to trick legitimate journalists into publishing erroneous or misleading articles. The term may also refer to such stories if planted by fake journalists, as well as the false story thereby published. A media prank is a form of culture jamming generally done as performance art or a practical joke for purposes of a humorous critique of mass media.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">WNAC-TV (Boston)</span> Television station in Massachusetts, United States

WNAC-TV, channel 7, was a television station located in Boston, Massachusetts, United States. The station was owned by RKO General. Originally established in 1948, WNAC-TV signed off for the final time at 1:00 a.m. on May 22, 1982, due to improprieties by its parent company; it was replaced that morning with WNEV-TV, which operates on a separate license. The station was Boston's original CBS television affiliate; except for a period from 1961 to 1972 during which it was an ABC affiliate, WNAC-TV would remain with CBS until its replacement with WNEV-TV.

References

  1. 1 2 Loohauls, Jackie (March 30, 1984). "These practical jokers didn't fool around". The Milwaukee Journal. Retrieved May 12, 2014.
  2. "Off beat: April Fool's joke had people blowing their tops weeks before mountain did". The Columbian. May 24, 2010. Retrieved May 12, 2014.
  3. 1 2 Sabulis, Thomas (April 3, 1980). "Ch. 7 reacts, cans jokester". The Boston Globe.
  4. 1 2 "Volcano joke ends in firing". Bowling Green Daily News . 3 April 1980. Retrieved 2 April 2014.
  5. 1 2 McNamara, Eileen (April 2, 1980). "'Yuk-Yuk News' (on Ch.7, folks) no joke in Milton". The Boston Globe.
  6. 1 2 Piot, Debra K. (4 April 1980). "TV station fires producer for airing April-fool prank". Christian Science Monitor . Retrieved 2 April 2014.