Why does Sky keep beating the BBC to the story?

When I blogged in March, in admiration of the Sky New's team's work in Zawiyah at the beginning of the Libyan revolution I could not have imagined the endgame I witnessed last night. Once again Sky News was well ahead of the BBC with Alex Crawford and the team at the heart of the rebel advance.  As it happened. It was riveting stuff.

They didn't just get lucky on the night. The frontline access they had, was given to them because of contacts with and the trust of the Zawiyah rebels. This was built by built Sky people on the ground, getting stuck in. Not through endless meetings back in London. Concentrate on and spend the money where it shows. Pretty much journalism 101. Something the many layers of management in BBC News have either forgotten or never knew in the first place.

I am very confident the team's efforts will not go unrewarded. They have certainly been recognised.

Foreign Office

150 people arrive back in UK on rescue flight from Libya...hurrah...but was that plane organised by the government? No by BP. Already perilously late Government charter stuck on tarmac at Gatwick for 10 hours.

Polish President's plane managed to take Brits.

Turkey, well known for efficient logistics, has got all its people out.

Libyan airport security firing automatic rounds to "calm" chaos -- does the FCO advice for British nationals to go to airport with lots of money still hold?

HMS Cumberland "waiting for permission" to dock at Bengazi. MMmm.

Cameron still poncing around the the Middle East as chaos reigns. Surely he can ring up the FCO and give them a rocket, after all he must have been at Eton with a fair number of the chinless wonders.

Foreign Office Advice ...continued...

Very interesting interview on WATO just now with woman who went to Tripoli Airport and was helped out of Libya by Portuguese Embassy staff on a Portuguese plane -- no sign of HMG's representatives at airport or before.

FCO clearly too busy supporting Cameron's ludicrous grandstanding tour of the Middle East.

Nul points to the chinless wonders.

Foreign Office advice on how to escape from a danger zone

You have to ask on which planet the chinless wonders of the Foreign Office reside. "Planet Common Sense" it ain't.

I see that they are sending out advice, from the safety of King Charles Street, to British citizens caught up in the crisis in Libya. You must leave, they say, without checking how that is to be achieved. If they had, they would have found that British Airways and British Midland have cancelled their flights from Tripoli. The airlines that are left flying out are all, surprise surprise, full.  Just go to the airport with lots of cash is the next nugget of wisdom, at the same time as reports of chaos at same airport. Well at least they alerted all the thieves and muggers in North Africa to look out for escaping Brits. We have no plans to organise special flights they conclude. No that would be useful.

I imagine this supremely incompetent or at best unthinking advice is a great comfort to our countrymen and women out there.