Shared Heartbreak...and Inspiration (2)

George Widman/AP

One of the most heartbreaking scenes from the recent West Virginia Sago mine tragedy came when one of the deceased miner's widows was interviewed on national TV and said something to the effect of, "We may be stupid, but we still love our families."

As with any tragedy where reporters, photographers, cameras, lights and microphones intrude upon the most personal of moments, there were examples of both the best and worst of human nature on display. The nation (or as much of it as heard the news at that late hour)rejoiced with the families as they celebrated the news that all but one of their loved ones had survived the disaster, and grieved with them when it turned out that all but one had not survived.

Despite some admirable actions on the part of the company, this crisis could have been handled much better, so we saw other more troubling images as well. We heard the family of the miner who was listed as deceased early on talk about how uncomfortable they felt at seeing the other families celebrate and virtually ignore them in their pain. We saw the same families who had praised what they interpreted as divine intervention one moment express doubts about that same loving God the next, once the news turned out to be tragic rather than miraculous.

The explanation, of course, is that we cannot expect people experiencing the most emotional times of their lives to be consistent in their thoughts - to speak in the scripted way we have come to expect in our Hollywoodized culture. These most personal of moments are not always pretty, consistent or fair.

What we can do when planning for a crisis is to anticipate the worst - false information, angry victims, agonizing hours of rumor rather than fact - and plan our reaction to them. We need to always keep in mind that the victims and their families come first. If we doubt the good news, even though we cannot confirm it, we need to tell them. We need to keep the media informed on a regular basis, even if it is just to say we don't know anymore than the last time we updated you. And we need to show the compassion that comes from the knowledge that any of us could be in the same situation as the victims, and that human life always matters more than anything else.