Confusing

Samples of bad writing by professional journalists abound, like the following example:
"Northwest Flight 255 stalled after takeoff and crashed onto a highway just after takeoff from Detroit. All six crew and 148 of 149 passengers were killed, as were two people on the ground. The sole survivor was a 4-year old girl who was found strapped into an airplane seat by a volunteer firefighter."


The way the sentence is written indicates that the firefighter strapped the sole survivor into a seat which doesn't make for a whole lot of sense. More likely, the survivor was found, strapped in a seat, by a a firefighter.

Some of the more common samples of bad writing occurs in crime reporting. It's amazing what people were shot with and where they were shot. One story reported that the home owner shot the burglar in the kitchen. Exactly what part of the body is the kitchen?

Fortunately, in most cases, the reader can determine what the writer meant even though that isn't a good excuse not to write properly.