Indian Ocean nations practice their tsunami response techniques

Times Live, compared to the brief overview Business Day presents, gives a detailed description of “Exercise Indian Ocean Wave 09”. I felt that the extra detail, such as the sort-comings experienced during the drill, was necessary to gain the full essence of the event. Times Live presents information about how the different countries organised the drill, as residents in some countries were not required to get involved. These extra bits of information enable the reader to recreate the scene. Times Live helped the recreation process along by including an image of a tsunami drill in Banda Aceh.

Times Live and Business Day give a list of 18 countries includes in the tsunami drill and Bua News says that South Africa was involved. The Bua News report is the only one that included South Africa. I found the Bua News report rather unprofessional as a spelling error was present and US spelling was used interchangeably with UK spelling–even though it is a South African government news agency and South Africa uses UK spelling.

Bua News has a very straightforward approach in reporting the event. Business Day and Times Live use a more sympathetic approach using quotes from residents who feel they need no reminding of the 2004 tsunami tragedy.

Overall, I enjoyed reading the Times Live news report as it presented an unbiased story with all the detail necessary to get the full picture of ‘Exercise Indian Ocean Wave 09’ and not just an outline.