A skeleton crew is the minimum number of personnel needed to operate and maintain an item such as a business, organization, or ship at its most simple operating requirements. Skeleton crews are often utilized during an emergency and are meant to keep an item's vital functions operating. The

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identi ...

is an example of when skeleton crews are used, such as in news stations.

Uses

* Shipboard – to keep a

ship A ship is a large watercraft that travels the world's oceans and other sufficiently deep waterways, carrying cargo or passengers, or in support of specialized missions, such as defense, research, and fishing. Ships are generally distinguished ...

operating after it has been damaged and awaiting tow to port. *

Blizzard A blizzard is a severe snowstorm characterized by strong sustained winds and low visibility, lasting for a prolonged period of time—typically at least three or four hours. A ground blizzard is a weather condition where snow is not falling ...

hurricane A tropical cyclone is a rapidly rotating storm system characterized by a low-pressure center, a closed low-level atmospheric circulation, strong winds, and a spiral arrangement of thunderstorms that produce heavy rain and squalls. Dep ...

s, and

typhoon A typhoon is a mature tropical cyclone that develops between 180° and 100°E in the Northern Hemisphere. This region is referred to as the Northwestern Pacific Basin, and is the most active tropical cyclone basin on Earth, accounting for a ...

s – to remain at a business location during a major storm to monitor conditions and to make emergency repairs if possible. * Inactivity – to keep an inactive facility, such as a commercial building in transition between owners, from being vandalized. * Temporary closings – to monitor and maintain the facility while it is otherwise shut down for a holiday, strike, etc. *

Medical Medicine is the science and practice of caring for a patient, managing the diagnosis, prognosis, prevention, treatment, palliation of their injury or disease, and promoting their health. Medicine encompasses a variety of health care practic ...

attention – to keep an inactive facility for radioactive poisoning. *

Film crew A film crew is a group of people, hired by a production company, for the purpose of producing a film or motion picture. The crew is distinguished from the cast, as the cast are understood to be the actors who appear in front of the camera o ...

– on a very low-budget production to shoot some form of media. *

Television Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertising, ...

and

radio station Radio broadcasting is transmission of audio (sound), sometimes with related metadata, by radio waves to radio receivers belonging to a public audience. In terrestrial radio broadcasting the radio waves are broadcast by a land-based radio ...

s – to meet license requirements. Most broadcasting authorities require a minimum of two employees, usually an engineer to handle on-air operations and transmitter maintenance, and a manager or clerk to maintain station records and correspondence. For stations on

automation Automation describes a wide range of technologies that reduce human intervention in processes, namely by predetermining decision criteria, subprocess relationships, and related actions, as well as embodying those predeterminations in machines ...

or which are

translator stations Translation is the communication of the meaning of a source-language text by means of an equivalent target-language text. The English language draws a terminological distinction (which does not exist in every language) between ''transla ...

, this allows the station to claim to meet local presence requirements in its

city of license In American, Canadian, and Mexican broadcasting, a city of license or community of license is the community that a radio station or television station is officially licensed to serve by that country's broadcast regulator. In North American b ...

even if all programming is originating elsewhere.

References

Business terms Nautical terminology {{naval-stub