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Introduction
When a tragedy happens involving a train or a passenger jet, people all over the world pay attention. Often accompanied by pictures showing burning wreckage or distraught next-of-kin at an airport, these accidents touch the lives of all of us. Because flying today is such a routine task, we feel that ‘It could have been me on that plane,’ and we are again reminded of our own mortality.
The following case studies describe how crisis management, top leadership and communications teams handled two aviation disasters and one exceptionally deadly train crash. They each showcase the importance of social media, and each event is a reminder of how a CEO becomes an important figure – whether he or she likes it or not.
Asiana Airlines: The Speed of Social Media
Case: An Asiana Airlines Boeing 777 from Seoul to San Francisco crashed into the runway while attempting to land at San Francisco Airport. Of the 291 passengers, 182 were injured and three lost their lives. The accident became a vivid example of how quickly news spreads through social media. Furthermore, it exemplified the importance of communicating well from all levels of an organization, and it proved that silence is not a recommended approach. The ‘15-seconds blog’ called the accident ‘Asiana’s Crash Course in Bad PR’ (15-seconds.com, 2013).
When: July 6, 2013
The timeline of the crash tells a compelling story of the speed of news spreading in the days of social media:
11.28: Asiana Airlines flight OZ214 crashes on runway 28 at San Francisco Airport.
11.29: Google employee Krista Seiden, who was at the airport ready to board another flight, uploads a picture of the crash on Twitter. Reporters from Sky News, CNN and NPR quickly reach out – through Twitter – to try to get her as a source for their news stories on the incident.
11.45: Survivors post photos of evacuation. One of them, David Eun, writes on Twitter (with an accompanying picture showing the crashed plane and evacuating survivors – with hand luggage): ‘I just crash landed at SFO. Tail ripped off. Most everyone seems fine. I’m OK. Surreal …’
12.08: First tweet from Boeing.
12.23: First tweet from NTSB (National Transportation and Safety Board.)
12.48: First tweet from SFO Airport – followed by 15 updates for the next 12 hours.
15.39: First tweet from Asiana Airlines.
By noon, there were more than 44,000 tweets about the accident, but the airline took several hours to post anything on social media about what had happened. Their excuse might have been that the Asiana headquarters are in Seoul, where it was night at the time of the accident and few people were in the office. For the first hours after the accident, therefore, their last Twitter message was from two days earlier – wishing everyone a happy Fourth of July.
The way news spread on Twitter about the accident must be something close to a record, as a picture of the crash was published one minute after it happened. Neither traditional media nor a company’s own communications team can ever compete with that, and this case study shows how hard it is to be on top of the news – and the importance of traditional and social media monitoring.
Asiana Airlines ‘woke up’ and published four updates on Twitter in the 12 hours following the crash. However, it took eight hours before they issued a press release, and when it came out it did not have any words on compassion or apology. Instead, it started with ‘The following information has been confirmed’ and continued to list the facts of the crash. It took nine hours for the phone number to the airline’s next-of-kin hotline to appear on their website. Asiana chose not to engage in any conversations on Twitter, and they did not answer a single direct question through social media.
A Late and Silent CEO
You would think that when you run an airline, you would have no problem obtaining a ticket to fly to a crash site. Nevertheless, it took the president of Asiana Airlines, Yoon Young-doo, three days to arrive in San Francisco. What made matters worse was that he had nothing to say to the 50 or so reporters who were waiting for him at the airport. The CEO was quickly surrounded by journalists demanding answers, and the mob scene ended with Young-doo being chased back through the arrivals door. There was no other spokesperson in the U.S. who could talk on the company’s behalf. This perplexing silence was repeated at a later press conference, where six of the 12 flight attendants from OZ214 took part. None of them spoke, and some hid their faces from the cameras.
There was also criticism in the media about how Asiana Airlines handled the surviving passengers. Many of them had no clothes, no luggage, no money and no passport, and several complained about not being heard or getting enough help. That they were instructed by the airline not to speak to reporters did not help matters (CBSNews, 2013).
Family assistance after an aircraft accident is taken seriously in the U.S., and federal laws protect the rights of surviving passengers and relatives. (See Chapter 9 for more information.) Asiana Airlines did not behave appropriately, and the company was later fined USD 500,000 for failing to help families after the July crash. This marked the very first time the Department of Transportation had issued a fine since a law about family assistance was introduced in 1997.
News from Authorities
American authorities and organizations displayed a very different approach to communicating about the accident. After the crash, the home page of SFO Airport had problems due to a very high number of visitors, but they made up for it with Facebook and Twitter as alternative platforms. They published constant updates on Twitter, made good use of hashtags and actively retweeted information from other sources. They were also able to answer individuals who had questions and comments about the situation at the airport.
NTSB – the National Transportation and Safety Board – sprang into action quickly. As is their goal, they posted a message on Twitter within one hour after the accident, and in the following hours and days they provided constant updates and streams of photos. During the first week of the accident, NTSB published 86 tweets with information on the crash, often providing factual information about the investigation and giving out pictures from the accident scene.
Victim of a Prank
If it hadn’t had such a tragic backdrop, the prank played on the local TV station KTVU might just have been a tough lesson in the importance of verification. In their noon broadcast on July 12, the news anchor told viewers that ‘KTVU has just learned the names of the four pilots who were on board,’ then continued to read out four fake names of the pilots. It is a bit bewildering how the names made it all the way to the live broadcast, as at least one of the names – ‘Captain Sum Ting Wong’ – should have told TV producers that some fact-checking was in order. Soon afterwards KTVU made a public apology, but they still received heavy criticism for having allowed racist jokes. It did not help them, or NTSB, that a summer intern at NTSB had confirmed to the TV station that the names were correct. The intern was fired soon afterwards, and the news segment became an instant hit on YouTube.
Germanwings: No Survivors, Many Questions
Case: Germanwings flight 4U 9525 crashed into the mountainside at Massif des Trois-Eveches in the French Alps, killing all 150 on board. Several commentators said later that the crisis communication from Lufthansa (parent company of Germanwings) was a ‘textbook response.’
When: March 24, 2015
Although the plane crashed in a remote area, news about the missing aircraft spread quickly. Flightradar24 was one of the first to report about the accident with a Twitter message that simply stated that the flight was lost from its radar. Within 90 minutes, the message was retweeted more than 2,000 times.
Germanwings published their first tweet about the incident within an hour and followed up with news on Facebook and their home page. In a later tweet they urged the public to monitor the website for updates, a task that became impossible, as the home page crashed and was unreachable for several hours. Social media therefore became extra important, and for the first 24 hours Germanwings published 24 messages on Twitter (14 in German, ten in English).
The CEO Steps In
Lufthansa, the parent company and owner of Germanwings, could have taken a sideline approach and let others handle the situation. That did not happen. Lufthansa’s CEO, Karsten Spohr, played an important and visible role in the following days and weeks. His name appeared in the first Twitter messages from Lufthansa, thereby showing the world that the tragedy was being handled at the highest level of the company.
Speaking at the first press conference about the tragedy, Spohr said that the tragedy ‘makes us speechless.’ He continued to express shock and stated that the crash was ‘our worst nightmare.’ The CEO showed commitment and care, and a few hours later he recorded a video message in English and German that was published on YouTube. He said that Lufthansa would support next-of-kin in any way, anywhere in the world, and that ‘safety in aviation is not a given.’ There were several reactions to the YouTube video in its comments field, positive as well as negative. One person wrote that Lufthansa showed a personal side of the business and genuine feeling about the sad events. Nobody could take away the fact that at this most difficult of times, Lufthansa showed responsibility.
A Logo in Mourning
The two airlines involved in the crash quickly changed their logos and branding on social media, an action that has become the norm in the airline industry. Germanwings recolored its logo to a black and white version, and Lufthansa did the same, while also changing the cover page on its Facebook page to show only a black rectangle.
Lufthansa went even further and used the hashtag #indeepsorrow when it published news and comments on social medi...
