"Frankenstorm" has become the go-to word to describe what is officially called Hurricane Sandy, the potential storm/hurricane/snow event that has meteorologists curled in the fetal position. But the Washington Post's Erik Wemple reported Friday that at least one network, CNN, has banned the term completely from its airwaves.
The reason? CNN says it doesn't want to trivialize the storm, which has the potential to do serious damage up and down the East Coast. ""It's a term that's not appropriate for a storm that's already killed more than 20 people," network meteorologist Chad Meyers told Wemple.
CNN meteorologist Rob Marciano tweeted similar news earlier on Friday:
Of course, there is always debate about media coverage of hurricanes. Hurricane Irene, for instance, kicked off a huge back-and-forth over whether or not coverage had been too hyperbolic. So far, meteorologists seem to be stressing how real they think the threat of Sandy is.