WAtoday.com.au enjoyed its best ever night of success at the WA Media Awards on Saturday night - with journalist Emma Young scoring two individual prizes and a team entry seeing the website recognised with best online reporting for its coverage of January's devastating Yarloop bushfires.
Young won best health/medical report for her coverage of six-year-old Oshin Kizsko, whose family was taken to court in an attempt to have their son undergo chemotherapy and radiotherapy for a brain tumour against their wishes. Judges noted it was "not only the best but one of the biggest stories of the year. She used modern digital reporting at its best to accompany sensitive and well balanced written pieces...a heartbreaking story which raised both moral and ethical queries in the medical and wider community."
![WAtoday's Tim Carrier, Emma Young, Fran Rimrod and Heather McNeill with Marta Pascual Juanola (second from left) and ...](/web/20161102105405im_/http://www.watoday.com.au/content/dam/images/g/s/e/3/4/7/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gsdyyq.png/1477807242620.jpg)
Young's other winning entry was in the science and environmental report category, for a series of stories about embarrassing planning bungles concerning a proposal to develop a new Lancelin caravan park. In the words of judges, "A good news story requires well researched and balanced reporting without bias. It must also pique public interest while finally getting a result, either negative or positive, for the protagonists. Emma Young's series met all these criteria."
The two awards were Young's third and fourth WA Media gongs, after previous wins while working for Community News.
![WAtoday's Heather McNeill, Fran Rimrod, Tom de Souza and Tim Carrier at the WA Media Awards.](/web/20161102105405im_/http://www.watoday.com.au/content/dam/images/g/s/e/3/0/8/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gsdyyq.png/1477807242620.jpg)
The WAtoday team's in-depth, comprehensive and sensitive coverage of the bushfires that killed two men and left hundreds homeless in WA's South West was rewarded with the award for best online coverage.
In the words of the judges: "The team made innovative use of the digital platform to provide extensive coverage that offered an important community service in a time of crisis and confusion. The well-curated collection of elements included good use of audio, a great collection of pictures and a compelling live blog...the inclusion of stories, not only about the devastation but of innovative ways that members of the broader WA community were seeking to support the victims extended the relevance of the coverage to a wider audience. In doing so, it is likely to have facilitated the provision of aid and support."
WAtoday also had another of the three finalists in the online category for a long-form multimedia piece on a new drug scourge in the state - The hidden high: flying high under the radar on synthetic meth.
In addition, Notre Dame Student Tom de Souza - the winner of the outstanding student journalism award - is a current intern at WAtoday and his award in part reflected an investigative piece he wrote on the drug issues of the Indonesian island of Gili Trawangan. Judges commended de Souza for his passion in delving "beyond surface judgements."
Fairfax's regional network was also in the spotlight on Saturday night, through a pair of awards for the Mandurah Mail.
The Mail's senior journalist Nathan Hondros was named best new journalist or cadet for a body of work that included stories on a Christian school's unwelcoming attitude to the gay father of a pupil and Coalition MP Andrew Hastie's dissatisfaction with the national strategy for July's election.
Meanwhile, Mandurah Mail photographer Marta Pascual Juanola won best news photograph for her work capturing the dramatic scenes that unfolded on Falcon Beach mid-year, as emergency services struggled to save surfer Ben Gerring from the shark attack that would ultimately take his life.
Andrew Probyn from The West Australian was named journalist of the year and also was a a winner of best news report and co-winner for best political report for his work covering the privatisation of Medicare.
The Clarion Award for an outstanding contribution to journalism went to Nick Evans of The West Australian, The Australian's Andrew Burrell was recognised in the feature writing category for his coverage of the Utopia Project, The Post's David Cohen was recipient of the Arthur Lovekin Award for excellence in journalism and the Sunday Times' Liam Barlett received the Matt Price Award for columnists.