FATALITY ATTRACTION DISASTERS: ULTIMATE TV DRAMA.

Byline: BRIDGET JOHNSON

WHEN I was a child, one of my favorite books was called ``Catastrophes,'' a coffee-table softcover with a huge picture of the Hindenburg bursting into flames gracing the cover.

Some educators might find this choice of reading material disturbing and draw from it psychoanalyses related to a chaotic environment. Yet even more troubling, it was apparently one of the first signs of a budding journalist - but no one recognized so, and thus intervention opportunities were missed.

Indeed, few things make the news pop quite like the disaster. It's the ultimate life-and-death struggle, the ultimate emotional upheaval, the ultimate six-column headline. And let's face it: Social Security solvency or Canadian elections wouldn't have had Shepard Smith and Geraldo Rivera screaming in the streets.

Disaster news generally moves like this: breaking spot news, overview of chaos and destruction, bureaucratic analyses (aka finger-pointing), heartwarming stories of survival and picking up the pieces. (During the Hurricane Katrina story, Rivera entered the picture somewhere between the destruction and blame-game stages and melded the two.)

No sooner had the rain stopped and the levee broken, though, and news outlets were trying to out-disaster the disaster. As New Orleans began assessing its losses, media tried to find the next big thing.

Is it a Pacific tsunami? A flurry of Midwest tornadoes? Al Gore's worst global-warming nightmare? A wildfire storm like the blazes that blew through Southern California in 2003?

Ah! California. Earthquakes. The proverbial Big One. Prediction of this off-the-charts temblor is usually accompanied by grainy images of a devastated San Francisco, circa 1906, and shots from the 1994 Northridge Earthquake and the Interstate 5 interchange that was brought down as the fault of the faults. This is followed by musings of which ghettos would become oceanfront property should a chunk of the Southland break off into the sea.

``Earthquake Vs. Hurricane - Which is Worse?'' screamed a headline in The Sacramento Union last week. ``Delta may be poised for disaster,'' proclaimed a Stockton-datelined AP headline. ``Anticipating the Big One'' was a Monday story in the San Francisco Chronicle.

Can the disaster be out-disastered?

In the Katrina aftermath we've also been deluged with terrorists trying to outdo their last terror threat. Orange County jihadist Adam Gadahn's threatening tape on Sept. 11 promised attacks on Los Angeles, thus making some jump when the power went out across town two days later. No al-Qaida culprit, but a DWP goof.

In the movie ``Team America: World Police,'' the team first discovers that the terrorists are planning ``9-11 times 100,'' then ``9-11 times 1,000,'' and finally the Kim Jong Il puppet reveals he's really planning ``9-11 times 2,356.''

Even after a big event, we fervently scan for the bigger event down the road.

Yes, you can say that news like this helps rattle readers and viewers to ensure we're prepared for any eventuality. I'm sure after watching parched Katrina victims on TV, more than a few Angelenos bought extra bottles of artesian spring water to keep on hand.

And when all is said and done, we pick to live in these volatile areas because of the vibrant cities and beautiful scenery, or because we're just suckers. After all, how many Mardi Gras parades or casting calls are there in the relatively disaster-free expanses cutting a swath through the nation?

Sure, you can't predict the fury of Mother Earth, but you can retrofit, hold on and hope for best. And buy bottled water.

In the meantime, perhaps our disaster fervor will cool just enough so we can relax a bit - says the columnist who stayed up all night to watch Geraldo screaming ``This is Dante's inferno!'' outside the New Orleans Convention Center.