Tuesday, July 16, 2013

Oakland's KTVU To Be Sued By Asiana Airlines Over Fake Crew Names

Posted By on Tue, Jul 16, 2013 at 10:42 AM

Remember Oakland TV station KTVU goofing, badly, on the supposed names of the Asiana Airlines crew?

Well, Asiana has taken exception to the report (which KTVU apologized for, as seen above):

Asiana has decided to sue KTVU-TV to "strongly respond to its racially discriminatory report" that disparaged Asians, Asiana spokeswoman Lee Hyomin said. She said the airline will likely file suit in U.S. courts.

She said the report seriously damaged Asiana's reputation. Asiana decided not to sue the NTSB because it said it was the TV station report, not the U.S. federal agency that damaged the airline's reputation. Lee did not elaborate.

Tom Raponi, KTVU Vice President & General Manager, said in a statement that KTVU would not be making any further comment because of the airline's threat of a lawsuit.

Neither the station nor the NTSB has said where the names originated.

Jalopnik has a good point as well, noting that "it also damaged the reputation of KTVU, since they reported the series of obviously fake names, and the NTSB, since their random summer intern confirmed it."

Either way, this isn't going away any time soon. Sorry about your damn luck, KTVU.

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