Add this to your list of internship don’ts.
An unnamed intern with the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) was fired on Monday after confirming racially offensive names given to the pilots on board Asiana Airlines Flight 214 when it crashed in San Francisco. The names were later read and displayed on air by Oakland’s KTVU Channel 2, which was covering the plane crash that claimed the lives of three Chinese teens.
The TV station broadcasted the names after “someone at the NTSB” confirmed that the pilots’ names were “Sum Ting Wong,” “Ho Lee Fuk,” “Wi Tu Lo,” and “Bang Ding Ow.” KTVU had called the NTSB to try and properly identify the pilots on board the aircraft before its devastating crash from a landing gone wrong. Following the broadcast, the NTSB immediately conducted an investigation and discovered that an intern had approved the error. No one is sure whether it was the intern who made up the names, but he still passed on very damaging information that embarrassed KTVU.
The error was so embarrassing that KTVU has removed the broadcast clip from the channel’s website, and The Washington Post writer Paul Farhi has described it as one of the most “widely snickered-about TV screw-ups in years.”
The NTSB released a statement on Friday that apologized for the mistake and described the intern as acting “outside the scope of his own authority.” KTVU has also come forward with its own apology while trying to piece together how none of its employees caught the racial slur.
Asiana Airlines confirmed yesterday that it will sue KTVU for airing the names.