With the mercury hitting 100 to 108, folks at the Rolla Daily News in Rolla, Mo., were hearing multiple calls across the police scanner about people leaving pets and even family members in cars. The staff decided to bake some car cookies, to demonstrate just how hot the interior of a vehicle can get. At the Lake Sun, in Camdenton, Mo., the newsroom decided to fry an egg on a car dashboard.
WHAT THEY DID: Rolla Daily News Editor Lynn Brennan picked up an indoor/outdoor thermometer from Wal-Mart. She put half of it inside a car, and brought the other part inside to see how hot the temperature inside the car would rise.
She placed cookie dough on a sheet on top of the dashboard, then went outside to snap photos of the cookies’ progress.
The car’s temperature rose to 158 degrees in 15 minutes, and the experiment made for a neat photo gallery. The gallery was added to a story about how to stay cool in high temperatures.
At the Lake Sun, the staff placed an egg in a frying pan on the dashboard of a car. In less than a minute, the edges of the egg began to turn white. The story published online included a photo galley of the egg frying, with quotes from local emergency personnel warning people about leaving pets and loved ones in vehicles.
THE TAKEAWAY: Taking a creative approach using multimedia can turn an otherwise routine story into something more interesting. The visual component of these stories made them worth clicking on – and really drove home the point that leaving pets and people in cars can be dangerous in hot weather.
With the mercury hitting 100 to 108, folks at the Rolla Daily News in Rolla, Mo., were hearing multiple calls across the police scanner about people leaving pets and even family members in cars. The staff decided to bake some car cookies, to demonstrate just how hot the interior of a vehicle can get. At the Lake Sun, in Camdenton, Mo., the newsroom decided to fry an egg on a car dashboard.
WHAT THEY DID: Rolla Daily News Editor Lynn Brennan picked up an indoor/outdoor thermometer from Wal-Mart. She put half of it inside a car, and brought the other part inside to see how hot the temperature inside the car would rise.
She placed cookie dough on a sheet on top of the dashboard, then went outside to snap photos of the cookies’ progress.
The car’s temperature rose to 158 degrees in 15 minutes, and the experiment made for a neat photo gallery. The gallery was added to a story about how to stay cool in high temperatures.
At the Lake Sun, the staff placed an egg in a frying pan on the dashboard of a car. In less than a minute, the edges of the egg began to turn white. The story published online included a photo galley of the egg frying, with quotes from local emergency personnel warning people about leaving pets and loved ones in vehicles.
THE TAKEAWAY: Taking a creative approach using multimedia can turn an otherwise routine story into something more interesting. The visual component of these stories made them worth clicking on – and really drove home the point that leaving pets and people in cars can be dangerous in hot weather.
