A large number of deaths in a mass tragedy may not be important enough for the event to become the top news story of the day: its perceived saliency depends on whether it is part of the broader media agenda, according to a study of Russian media coverage of three different tragedies which occurred on the same day in December 2016, namely the assassination of the Russian ambassador in Turkey, a mass poisoning by alcohol-containing hawthorn lotion in Irkutsk and a terrorist attack in Berlin.
