World media in a frenzy over British royal baby
Source: AFP |
July 14, 2013, Sunday
|
Print Edition
Print Edition
THE media frenzy over the birth of Prince William and his wife Catherine's baby reached fever pitch yesterday as the reported due date came and went with no sign of the royal heir.
A rumor that the Duchess of Cambridge had gone into labor on Thursday spread like wildfire on Twitter and reportedly caused Prime Minister David Cameron's office to call Buckingham Palace to check on it.
It was another false alarm, but the dozens of international journalists camped outside the private London hospital where Kate is giving birth are on tenterhooks, knowing that it could happen any day now.
The palace has said the baby was due in "mid-July" and many editors have had this weekend in the diary for weeks - even though any parent knows that babies rarely arrive on time.
William's father, Prince Charles, revealed that it is not just royal observers waiting for the baby, as they attended a festival celebrating Queen Elizabeth II's coronation on Friday.
Charles, the heir to the throne who will become a grandfather for the first time, said "it won't be long now" as he surveyed a range of commemorative china to mark the new arrival.
The popularity of William and Kate, who married in a glittering wedding at Westminster Abbey in 2011, has turned the birth of their first child into a global event.
Media organizations have been installed outside St Mary's Hospital in Paddington for almost two weeks now, and in the absence of news, time has been passing slowly.
For the television networks, the top priority is to hold their positions around the clock, working 12-hour shifts in baking summer heat.
That means fiercely defending their territory, never yielding an inch of space to a rival station, and woe betide anyone touching the gaffer tape marking out an organization's patch.
A rumor that the Duchess of Cambridge had gone into labor on Thursday spread like wildfire on Twitter and reportedly caused Prime Minister David Cameron's office to call Buckingham Palace to check on it.
It was another false alarm, but the dozens of international journalists camped outside the private London hospital where Kate is giving birth are on tenterhooks, knowing that it could happen any day now.
The palace has said the baby was due in "mid-July" and many editors have had this weekend in the diary for weeks - even though any parent knows that babies rarely arrive on time.
William's father, Prince Charles, revealed that it is not just royal observers waiting for the baby, as they attended a festival celebrating Queen Elizabeth II's coronation on Friday.
Charles, the heir to the throne who will become a grandfather for the first time, said "it won't be long now" as he surveyed a range of commemorative china to mark the new arrival.
The popularity of William and Kate, who married in a glittering wedding at Westminster Abbey in 2011, has turned the birth of their first child into a global event.
Media organizations have been installed outside St Mary's Hospital in Paddington for almost two weeks now, and in the absence of news, time has been passing slowly.
For the television networks, the top priority is to hold their positions around the clock, working 12-hour shifts in baking summer heat.
That means fiercely defending their territory, never yielding an inch of space to a rival station, and woe betide anyone touching the gaffer tape marking out an organization's patch.
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