A theme park? Well, it's a Star 'exclusive' - that must be the only reason it's not being reported elsewhere.
A twelve paragraph story follows - most of which is about the rescue. Rather suspiciously, only two paragraphs mention the 'theme park':
The Chilean Tourist Board now aims to turn the mine site into a money-spinning theme park. They are also set to offer adventure holidays including a trip underground on the rescue capsule that brought the 33 to safety.
No decision has been made on when it could be opened but a spokesman for Turismo Chile said: “We think many people will be attracted. There is great tourist potential.”
Google finds no other website carrying that quote. It also finds that when you search for 'Chile mine theme park' the first result is the Star and the second is a website called The Spoof:
(image slightly edited to remove banner advert)The Spoof says it is 'Always there with the funniest spoof headlines'. Apparently, one website's spoof headline is the Daily Star's front page 'news'.
The Independent's Guy Adams is in Chile and has been reporting on the rescue operation from the scene. Had he heard about these theme park plans?
(hat-tip to Gav Powell)
Hahaha - they did the same spoof on Have I Got News For You last night - well, the guest comedian used it as a joke in passing anyway.
ReplyDeleteThey've not changed the headline on the (Star) website yet. Astonishing.
ReplyDeletePresumably if it was opened as a theme park it would be a goldmine!
ReplyDeleteThey could at least have had the decency to steal from a spoof site that isn't awful.
ReplyDeleteHas anyone actually contacted Turismo Chile and asked them directly though, or are we just assuming that the Star is wrong?
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-11549110
ReplyDeleteThe BBC have something similar, the Caroline Hawley sidebar at http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-11549110 reads "Officials say the San Jose Mine where they suffered so much may now be turned into a museum." Have they fallen for it too?
I think there is a big difference between a museum where people can go along to look at the site and see some of the artefacts from the rescue and a theme park with rides and other attractions. I don't think being dragged up and down a small hole in a cramped capsule would be really that much of an attraction.
ReplyDeleteNot a massive deal, but thought this was funny (i can't do screenshots):
ReplyDeletehttp://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/index.html
About half way down the page under 6 of the editor's best - they've actually put the term "'elf" and safety on a serious headline, which is then replaced by "Health" in the actual page.
You couldn't make it up. Be interested to know if this turns out to be insurance investors rather than H&S as well
Just shows (again) the contempt in which they hold their readership.
ReplyDeleteProbably the reason the Star has put it in the newspaper is because someone else said it. In this case the Spoof site.
ReplyDeleteVery similar to the Daily Sport and it's "Bus on the Moon" stories. I vaguely remember the editor being asked about these obviously crap stories and he said that if someone told them something then it was "news" and could be published. So if a nutter told them a bus was on the Moon, the Sport would print it.
The Star is just doing the same. It's probably also got the same readership IQ level as well. ;-)