The East Bay Times has won the Pulitzer Prize for breaking news for its coverage of December’s Ghost Ship fire — the fifth time a Bay Area News Group paper has gained journalism’s highest award.
In a Monday announcement, the judges said the Times received the award “for relentless coverage of the ‘Ghost Ship’ fire, which killed 36 people at a warehouse party, and for reporting after the tragedy that exposed the city’s failure to take actions that might have prevented it.”
Bay Area News Group journalists, who produce coverage for the Times and the Mercury News, were the first to uncover problems with the city’s inspections and permitting of the Ghost Ship building, initially reporting the issue on BANG websites less than 12 hours after the Dec. 2 blaze. In subsequent days and weeks, the coverage expanded to encompass the lives of the victims, mostly young artists and musicians, and the housing crisis that has driven so many Bay Area residents into substandard dwellings like the Ghost Ship.
A narrative story, “The Last Hours of the Ghost Ship,” won enormous praise for taking readers inside the warehouse as the fire started, then raged out of control, and Oakland firefighters fought to save those inside. In the months since, BANG journalists have continued to report on the system breakdowns that allowed so many people to cram into a firetrap whose dangers should have been obvious. City officials have now begun to overhaul their fire inspection and other practices.
The Pulitzer Prize for breaking news reporting is awarded for “a distinguished example of local reporting of breaking news that, as quickly as possible, captures events accurately as they occur, and, as time passes, illuminates, provides context and expands upon the initial coverage.”
“Winning the most prestigious honor in journalism is humbling,” said Neil Chase, executive editor of the East Bay Times and the Mercury News. “It’s testimony to the incredible efforts of our talented journalists and their dedication to serving this community and discovering the truth about what happened.”
Chase said the news organization will contribute the $15,000 in award money to a fund for families of the fire victims.
It was the third national award for the East Bay Times coverage of the deadly blaze.
The American Society of News Editors, in giving the Times its breaking news award, described the work as “digital storytelling at its best.” The Ghost Ship fire coverage also won the 2016 Scripps Howard Award for breaking news.
This year’s Pulitzer Prize is the fifth awarded to a publication in the Bay Area News Group, the news organization that produces coverage for the East Bay Times, the Mercury News and 29 community weekly publications, in print and digital editions.
Others included the 1990 prize for spot news photography, won by the photo staff of the Oakland Tribune for its coverage of the Loma Prieta earthquake. The Mercury News staff won the general news reporting prize the same year for its coverage of the earthquake.
The Mercury News won the 1986 international reporting prize for a series by Lewis M. Simons, Pete Carey and Katherine Ellison “that documented massive transfers of wealth abroad by President Marcos and his associates and had a direct impact on subsequent political developments in the Philippines and the United States.” The Oakland Tribune’s Bill Crouch won the 1950 photography prize for his photo “Near Collision at Air Show.”
Read ongoing coverage of the Ghost Ship fire investigations here. Profiles of the victims are here.
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