Like most entities that serve the public, airports want to look good. They want to show how big they are and all the bells and whistles they have. And if they have good news to share, they want to share it!
In July 2022, Toronto Pearson International Airport (YYZ) was ranked the worst airport in the world for flight delays, according to FlightAware. Yep, dead last.
At the time, more than half (52.5%) of the flights scheduled at YYZ between May 26 and July 19 were delayed (the next worst airport, Frankfurt Airport, “only” had 45.4% of flights delayed). On top of that, Pearson ranked 4th worst in the world for cancellations; 6.5% of its flights were cancelled during the same period (China’s Shenzhen Bao’an International Airport was THE worst, at 7.9% of its flights cancelled).
But it’s a new summer and YYZ’s CEO, Deborah Flint said at a press conference last week that they had, “…seen almost a doubling in on-time performance since last year.”
Flint even “humble bragged” how YYZ had “significantly improved” its operations, even in the face of so much of North America’s airline industry having so many problems this summer.
“That is a reflection of all the work that we’ve done across the ecosystem together with our partner airlines, with agencies, reducing processing time, reducing wait times, and fine-tuning operations with our air carrier partners,” she said. “And we see the great results from that.”
But the cameraperson for the press conference showed a different story. Watch this clip:
Amazing story telling by the camera operator here.
— Blaise (@boehmerB) July 18, 2023
Whoopsie. And #micdrop for that cameraperson.
The Twitterverse, of course, was right ON the gaffe, though:
- Her next staff meeting after this should be a joy! — Rand Ridley
- Wow, I’ve never seen a complete, uncensored murder on live television. — Punished J-Dubs
- Cameraman proving that they are not passive journalists. — Dr. Guramritpal Singh
- A brilliant piece of cinematography! A drop the camera moment — Randy Ridley
- Give the cameraman a raise!– Mister Chiveroxx
- Cameraperson wrote an op-ed right there. — Andrew Smith
- I really want to see her reaction once she saw how she got completely called out. — AmericanAV8R
- And the Emmy for cinematography goes to … — Funky D
Of course, each flight’s delay or even cancellation will have its own story and it’s very possible they were all (or mostly all) due to weather conditions or holdups at other airports, which were beyond the control of YYZ. But the irony of the moment? *chefskiss*
Feature Photo: pxfuel
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