With Castro Sidelined, Florida Newspapers Working Overtime

By: Sarah Weber Soon after news broke that an ailing Fidel Castro had temporarily stepped down as leader of Cuba Monday night, massive rallies and celebrations began in Miami and other parts of southern Florida, areas that are home to nearly 1 million Cuban Americans. Today, newspapers in Miami and Fort Lauderdale are working overtime to cover a story that many of their readers have been anxiously awaiting for years.

Castro announced Monday that he was relinquishing power to his brother Raul while recovering from intestinal surgery. The Cuban dictator's statement said that his ailment involved "sharp intestinal crisis with sustained bleeding," a pronouncement that had many papers turning to medical experts for speculation as to whether the condition may be life-threatening. Though the true seriousness of Castro's declining health remains somewhat unclear, the staffs of The Miami Herald and the South Florida Sun-Sentinel are nevertheless working hard to cover the latest developments.

"For us, this is the biggest story there is," said Rick Hirsch, the Herald's managing editor of multimedia. "We are in overdrive already, talking about how this could be a story that goes on for days or weeks or months."

The Miami Herald is devoting major resources to the story. Today, nearly half of the MiamiHerald.com front page was allotted to Castro's declining health. Stories included local reactions from state politicians and Cuban exiles, blogging reports from the Miami area, and many video and multimedia reports showing the reactions of Miami locals as well as those in Havana. The Herald is also bringing out its prepared coverage for revision, including Castro's prewritten obit.

"We have done a lot of planning over the years for how we will handle and cover Castro's death," Hirsch told E&P. "It's something that we revise every year.

"Some may say that this is just like any other high-profile person, but this is not just any high-profile person. This is somebody who had a profound, and in some ways horrifying, impact on hundreds and hundreds of thousands of people's lives."

Managing Editor/News Dave Wilson agrees with Hirsch, adding that the huge impact of this story on southern Florida cannot be overestimated.

"It plays differently [in South Florida]," Wilson said. "There are people here who have come from Cuba recently or 40 or 50 years ago. People whose loved ones have fallen to terrible fates at the hands of Castro's regime, others who have a dream of returning to a free Cuba.

"The range of emotions here is huge and it's our job to capture it."

Just as the online edition of the Miami Herald devoted much of its coverage to Castro, the morning edition of today's paper had what Wilson estimated as two pages of Castro coverage, much of which was played on Page One.

The Herald has also made good use of its contacts in Cuba. Hirsch said that the Herald has several reporters who have nurtured relationships with Cuban sources for years. Wilson also noted this, adding that the Herald "had to get very creative over the years to have resources in Cuba because we're not able to travel freely to Cuba like CNN" or other major news outlets.

Sharon Rosenhouse, the managing editor of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel, noted that her paper also had Castro-related stories on most of its front page this morning under a banner headline that read "Castro Yields Powers."

"We scrambled last night because it broke late," Rosenhouse said, "but I think we had pretty good hustle."

"It's a very big story here," she added, "and we're going to do everything it takes to emphasize it and give it the space that it requires. I wouldn't rule anything out."

Unlike the Herald, the Sun-Sentinel has the benefit of a Havana news bureau, courtesy of parent company Tribune Co.

"We have many years of being on the ground in Havana," said Rosenhouse, "and I think people look to us for that."

Both Rosenhouse and the staff at the Herald agreed that the hunger for news about Cuba is insatiable in their region, and both papers are going to continue to devote significant time and resources to adeptly cover Castro's situation. Both newspapers also noted that in the midst of the breaking Cuban news, southern Florida is watching Tropical Storm Chris approach its shores as well.

The Herald's approach to Castro is much like the all-encompassing coverage of an approaching hurricane, Hirsh noted.

"Maybe Fidel will be the first hurricane of the season," he mused.