Topic: Disaster Relief and Recovery
People living in the areas hardest hit by Hurricane Sandy tuned in to radio. Arbitron reported that from 7 p.m. to midnight on October 29, when Sandy first hit New Jersey, an average of more than one million people in the New York metro area were listening to the radio during any 15 minute period, a 70 percent increase over the same period in the week prior. The area in the Arbitron report consists of New York City, five counties in New York, nine counties in New Jersey and part of one county in Connecticut. Coastal area listenership exploded, with an increase of 367 percent in Stamford and Norwalk, Conn., 247 percent in Monmouth County and 195 percent in New Jersey’s Middlesex, Somerset and Union counties. The extensive storm coverage on a variety of formats highlights broadcast radio’s service to local communities. Sean Ross, a radio analyst in New Jersey, noted that "radio still has an authority that not every tweet has."
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More than 2.47 million American jobs depend on broadcasting, and the local broadcast radio and television industry - and the businesses that depend on it - generate $1.17 trillion annually for the nation's economy.
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