Dave Helling Gets a Dart
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Last year we said that we would follow the KCTV5 story wherein KCTV5 reporter Dave Helling claimed to have bought 500 of ammonium nitrate from McGraw’s Fertilizer in Tonganoxie, Kansas, in an effort to show that terrorists could get their hands on enough of the material to create a bomb. What he had actually bought was 500 lbs of a common lawn fertilizer which mixes the ammonium nitrate with potash and phosphate into a mixture called 20-10-10. When confronted with the truth by the Tonganoxie Mirror and the Kansas Agribusiness Retailers Association, KCTV5 and Mr. Helling refused to correct, clarify, or repudiate the story although they did remove the video of it from their website.
Now, the “Darts & Laurels,” column of the Columbia Journalism Review (March/April 2005 issue) has also criticized the KCTV5 story.
[A dart] to KCTV, the CBS affiliate in Kansas City, Missouri, for forcing a story to bloom despite its genetic flaws. Three weeks after KMOV in St. Louis aired its fruitful investigation into the easy accessibility of the explosive fertilizer ammonium nitrate in Missouri (see left), KCTV set out to sow similar seeds in Kansas. This time, however, the crop failed.
It is, in fact, possible to make a bomb out of 20-10-10 fertilizer, but only if the bomb maker takes the time to sift through all of the particles separating out the ammonium nitrate from the other ingredients. A process that would take an “eon” according to the experts the CJR asked.
The result?
Such inconvenient details notwithstanding, Helling solemnly concluded, “It is clear tonight — very clear — that security remains a concern across the country.� Indeed it does. It is also clear — very clear — that shoddy journalism remains a concern across the country. Just ask Mr. McGraw.
MickC @ April 20, 2005