It looks like Asiana Airlines finally came to its senses over its prior decision to sue KTVU over the TV station’s broadcast that erroneously aired the fake names of pilots falsely purported to be with the airline’s flight 214.
From Yonhap News:
Asiana Airlines Inc. said Wednesday it has withdrawn its plan to file a defamation suit against a U.S. television station for damaging the carrier’s reputation over the deadly crash of its plane in San Francisco.”We decided not to proceed with the suit to concentrate all our efforts on dealing with the aftermath of the accident,” the South Korea’s second-largest flag carrier said in a statement.
I’d say “Streisand Effect averted,” but I think it’s probably more minimized than averted at this point.
Meanwhile, Asiana is still expected to face legal action itself.
From The Atlantic:
Yesterday, lawyers representing 83 passengers on the crashed flight filed the initial documents for a lawsuit against Boeing, the company that manufactured the jet that crashed. Ribbeck Law Chartered, a Chicago-based law firm, filed a petition for discovery in Cook County Circuit Court in Illinois that demands the defendants turn over all possible relevant information for the type of aircraft that crashed—a Boeing 777. Asiana wasn’t included in the initial court filing, but the airline’s name will be added at some point over the next few days. Another lawsuit filed in California by a woman and her son who were passengers on the flight is seeking at least $5 million in damages for injuries suffered in the crash. We have a feeling the litigious backlash is just starting.
Seems to me that the airline’s decision not to proceed with a suit against KTVU and to instead focus its efforts on dealing with the accident’s aftermath is probably a good one. Especially since there was never a viable legal theory in the first place for Asiana to bring a lawsuit against KTVU, a move that some legal experts considered spectacularly inadvisable.
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