Circulation of Seattle's two major daily newspapers, in general decline for years, took another hit Friday when it dropped to nearly zero.
A Thursday-night windstorm knocked out power to the papers' printing plant after only 13,000 copies of the Seattle Times and no copies of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer had been printed. The papers' Web sites directed readers to electronic versions online. The News Tribune of Tacoma was able to publish and at Sea-Tac Airport there was no noticeable shortage of New York Times, Wall Street Journal or other publications with alternate production.
It's hard to overstate the significance of a daily paper not publishing -- an event that is supposed to happen no matter what. For example, many in the Northeast managed to print despite the 2003 blackout. In Seattle, the lapse seems sure to push more readers to the Internet, at the expense of the dead-tree versions that still carry most newspaper advertising.