What was the most challenging aspect of covering the Exxon Valdez spill?
Click here for ordering information. Our paper won a Pulitzer, I think, because we tried to put the spill, oil production and tanker safety in a broader perspective. This was a story not just about an Exxon screw-up, but modern American civilization. Getting past the “spin” of all sides, from Exxon to environmentalists, was the challenge, and required talking to many different sides and looking at many different documents. And despite the beauty of Prince William Sound, the work was also sometimes cold, wet and disheartening. One of the odd things was that I arrived on the scene so early, and was so cut off from ordinary media — since Exxon had bought up all the motel rooms I spent the summer in a woman’s basement, without TV — that I didn’t realize what a big international story it had become until I returned to Seattle some weeks after the spill. I hadn’t seen my own newspaper. How did winning a Pulitzer affect you? Were you surprised when you won? Well, as two-time winner Russell
