Is this the sign of the new Jeff Zucker era?

CNN decided yesterday to sink its resources into wall-to-wall coverage of the Carnival cruise ship's slow slog to shore.

Critics pounced, saying this story didn't deserve that much airtime.

- Huffington Post noted that while Fox and MSNBC covered other issues during the late morning and early afternoon, CNN was laser focused on the ship with a helicopter to provide immediate coverage.

- I'd show you the Jon Stewart clip mocking CNN but this blog software doesn't allow me to do so. You can see it here.

In it, Stewart showed a clip of a young girl on the ship waving to her mother via the TV cameras.

"You're not heroes, guys," Stewart said, to CNN. "It's not a hostage situation or a baby in a well. You reconnected them? They weren't supposed to see each other. They were on a cruise for a few days."

-  MSNBC's morning host Joe Scarborough noted: "Because of the problems with this cruise line, all of the problems in the world stopped. The killing in Syria — it came to an end. Yesterday on Capitol Hill, Republicans and Democrats hugged. The whole idea of a historic hold on the Secretary of Defense — they just said, 'Let's just put this aside because of the big cruise ship debacle.'"

- Mediate did a count: On Thursday and Friday morning, CNN mentioned the Carnival non-disaster 168 times, compared with 62 mentions by Fox News, and only 25 by MSNBC.

- The New York Times said the story was right up Zucker's alley:

The coverage had all the hallmarks of Jeff Zucker, the former “Today” show producer and NBC chief executive who took over CNN Worldwide last month. Mr. Zucker has been trying to take advantage of CNN’s news resources as he attempts to revitalize the low-rated channel. The cruise ship story was a no-brainer to him: from a producer’s standpoint, it has high stakes, human drama and a logical beginning, middle and end. The ship is expected to finally reach port Thursday night.

CNN sent out a release about its coverage yesterday morning.

The squalid, smelly, steamy cruise ship, which has been without power for days with 4,000 people aboard, is expected to finally limp into port later today.  CNN’s Erin Burnett will anchor Erin Burnett OutFront from Mobile, Alabama, where the ship will dock.  Sandra Endo covers the ship’s arrival by helicopter; Victor Blackwell monitors by boat; and David Mattingly and Martin Savidge report from the dock in Mobile. CNN.com/live and the CNN apps will live stream the docking. CNN International will simulcast the arrival later tonight.

On Saturday at 7:30pmET and 10:30pmET, CNN will broadcast "Cruise from Hell: Stranded at Sea," a 30 minute special reported by Martin Savidge.

UPDATE: Zucker, I'm sure, couldn't care less about these critiques. Why? Ratings were up significantly. Hit a story of interest and hit it hard, appears to be Zucker's strategy. According to the New York Times:

For the whole day CNN had an average of 632,000 viewers watching at any given time, up about 50 percent versus typical Thursdays this year. MSNBC had 535,000, down slightly. Fox News remained on top with 1.38 million, up slightly.

The same was true in prime time, when the ship neared the port of Mobile. CNN had an average of 1.03 million viewers at any given time from 8 to 11 p.m., up 62 percent versus typical Thursdays this year. MSNBC had fewer — 867,000 — and Fox had more, 2.14 million. Those two channels mostly stuck with their regular lineups until the ship was within sight of the port of Mobile.