A fishy fleeing-Dubai story

Am I the only one whose BS meter went off over the story about foreigners in debt fleeing Dubai and abandoning their cars at the airport?

The papers keep reporting that some people are even leaving notes of apology on the windshield.

Right, because if you're fleeing the country to avoid jail over bankruptcy, you'll leave a note that could be found by cops before you get away.

Best as I can tell it first ran in the Times of London last week.

Here are the sources for that story:
"said one senior airport security official, who did not want to be named"
"one senior banker said"
"a Western diplomat"
"Louise, a single mother from Britain"

The only identifiable source comes at the end:

Simon Goldsmith, a spokesman for the British Embassy in Dubai, said that that there were approximately 100,000 Britons living in Dubai last year. However, the embassy has no way of tracking how many have fled back to the UK. “We’ve heard stories, but when somebody makes that kind of decision, they generally keep it to themselves,” he said.

So the story got picked up a lot, including today by the New York Times. Weird thing in their story as well, including the attribution here:

Some are said to have maxed-out credit cards inside and notes of apology taped to the windshield.

And the reporter's tagline is odd as well:

A New York Times employee in Dubai contributed reporting.

To add just one more layer of weird, this story from the Gulf News on Saturday: "Only 11 cars abandoned at airport in past year."

Related: That swim-across-the-Atlantic story: not true.

Labels: media

- posted by Amy @ 2/12/2009 07:11:00 PM