KTVU Apologizes for Reading Fake Racist Pilot Names in Asiana SFO Crash (VIDEO, PHOTO)
KTVU has apologized after identifying the pilots from the Asiana Airlines crash in San Francisco's SFO Airport with a number of racist names such as "Captain Sum Ting Wong" and "Wi Tu Lo."
The network has tried to explain its embarrassing mistake, saying it was handed the pilots' names by the NTSB and did not fully check them out before broadcasting them to the world.
The network has been in damage control after posting the names of the four pilots flying the ill-fated Asiana flight as "Captain Sum Ting Wong," "Wi Tu Lo," "Ho Lee Fuk," and "Bang Ding Ow."
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It was not long before the network realized that it had provided the public with false, and racist names, and they quickly issued an on-air apology.
The network has also followed that quick apology up with official statements on social media sites Twitter and Facebook, and has also issued an official apology on their website.
The network has insisted that none of its staff made up the names, and they received the information from the NTSB - The National Transportation Safety Board.
In response the NTSB has released a statement saying that one of its interns went rogue and sent out the false and racist information to various news networks including KTVU.
Even though KTVU has pointed to the information as coming from NTSB, it has stated that it accepts "full responsibility" for not checking the information and for mistakenly broadcasting the potentially offensive names.
The KTVU statement says: "We made several mistakes when we received this information. First, we never read the names out loud, phonetically sounding them out. Then, during our phone call to the NTSB where the person confirmed the spellings of the names, we never asked that person to give us their position with the agency. We heard this person verify the information without questioning who they were and then rushed the names on our noon newscast."
