Sorry for the crude headline – but really – authorities should understand what they are saying/publishing.

This yesterday:

24 January 2012
Moreton Bay Regional Council is advising residents in Dale Street and immediate surrounds in Burpengary to self-evacuate this afternoon.

See: Burpengary residents urged to evacuate

It was a common error throughout the 2011 floods in Queensland. Constantly authorities were asking people to self-evacuate.

Think about it – to evacuate oneself – what are they actually asking people to do?

It was a lesson I learnt early on in journalism. A person is evacuated from somewhere – a building/location or is urged to evacuate from a place/location etc.

So the alert should have read: “Moreton Bay Regional Council is advising residents in Dale Street and immediate surrounds in Burpengary to evacuate from their homes.”

There, that wasn’t so hard was it?

Unfortunately other authorities trying to get the messages out to people quickly are just repeating this error and then (sigh) the media reiterates it as well without really thinking about what is being said/written.

Further ref:

BBC News: The Editors – On evacuation…

Grammar Underground – Can you evacuate a person

#justsaying