Media outlets were quick to wrongly blame hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, for a magnitude 5.6 earthquake in Oklahoma over the weekend.
Forbes, Newsweek, the Dallas Morning News and ABC News all pointed the finger at fracking. Bloomberg even wrote three separate articles blaming fracking.
“Experts have stated over and over again that the fracking is not the cause of earthquakes in Oklahoma. Wastewater disposal from day-to-day production — a completely separate process from fracking — is the likely cause,” Seth Whitehead, a researcher for the pro-industry group Energy In Depth, told The Daily Caller News Foundation. “Unfortunately, the false notion that fracking causes earthquakes prevails — and many media outlets’ coverage of the earthquake near Pawnee, Oklahoma, over Labor Day weekend is the prime example why. Many click-bait happy media outlets seemed more interested in getting the word ‘fracking’ in headlines than reporting the facts.” – READ MORE
