The 10 worst airline PR disasters of all time – where does BA's meltdown rank?

In theory, running an airline should be a simple business. A plane full of passengers takes off from Airport A at an arranged time, lands at Destination B without being late, and everyone disembarks happily to reclaim their bags and go about their holiday in the sun.

But as recent events have demonstrated, the air industry is rarely a straightforward place in which to operate. Computer glitches, embarrassing incidents, indefensible comments from senior figures, social-media spats and even disturbing dealings with livestock can all damage a brand. Are the 10 episodes detailed here the worst airline public relations disasters ever? Maybe – none of them have done the carriers in question any favours…

1. British Airways goes into meltdown

The say great comedy is all about timing. The same principle applies to PR catastrophes. If you are going to have an IT failure that grounds many of your services in and out of the UK’s two biggest airports, causing considerable harm to your name, then one of the days to avoid would be the Saturday of a bank holiday weekend at the start of the May half-term holidays. Such was the nightmare scenario for British Airways four days ago when a glitch in its computer systems affected over 1,000 flights – via cancellations or delays – that were due to take off from or land at Heathrow and Gatwick. Throw in reports of poor customer service and a lack of information for frustrated passengers, and you have one murky soup of a situation. Welsh international tennis player Chloe Thomas, caught up in the debacle at Heathrow, described what she witnessed as “chaos”. “People are running about all over the place trying to rebook,” she commented. “There’s no-one to help, no leadership. There are lots of people everywhere. There’s nowhere to sit, so people are just lying on the floor, sleeping on yoga mats.” Not BA’s finest hour, it is probably fair to say.

How the airline recovered

BA has been in Deeply Apologetic Mode for the last half a week. “I know this has been a horrible time for customers,” the airline’s chief executive Alex Cruz said in a statement posted to YouTube. “Some have missed holidays, some have been stranded on aircraft, some separated from bags and some stuck in long queues while they have waited for information. On behalf of everyone at BA, I want to apologise for the fact that you’ve had to go through these very trying experiences.” For all these humble words, estimates suggest that the airline’s compensation bill could reach £100m.

2. Aeroflot taken to task over body image

Russia’s national carrier found itself flying through public-relations turbulence in April after being taken to court by two long-serving female members of its cabin crew. Evgenia Magurina and Irina Ierusalimskaya claimed that they had been sidelined and effectively had their wages cut by an internal decision to have better-paid international flights staffed exclusively by employees under a certain weight and dress size. “They told us all that only the young and thin will fly abroad for Aeroflot,” Magurina alleged. Astonishingly, an Aeroflot official appeared to confirm her complaint. “Aeroflot is a premium airline and part of the reason people pay for tickets is the appearance of its employees,” a spokesman announced at a press conference. “Ninety-two percent [of our passengers] want to see stewardesses who fit into the clothes sizes that we are talking about here.”

How the airline recovered

Somewhat bizarrely, Aeroflot distanced itself from its own spokesperson’s comments, saying that he did not speak on behalf of the company. It also won both cases. “We are pleased with the rulings, which vindicate our position,” it said in a brief statement. In truth, the airline has weathered worse, and in the last 20 years, has transformed itself from a bruised brand with a bad safety record into one of the planet’s top air industry players. You can read more about this particular Russian Revolution here.

3. Ryanair crew sees red

There was a time when Ryanair seemed to be the embodiment of the idea that “there’s no such thing as bad publicity”. No PR stunt was too cheap; no blast of self-sale too tacky. Witness the 2012 decision to put out adverts emblazoned with the words “Red Hot Fares & Crew” – which saw cheap prices printed alongside pictures of female Ryanair cabin crew members wearing, well, not much. The airline said that all employees in the photos had consented to their use in the promotion. The Advertising Standards Authority was unimpressed and banned the ads – declaring them likely to cause “widespread offence”.

How the airline recovered

In 2013, Ryanair decided to alter its abrasive public image under an “Always Getting Better” PR strategy. Customer service was improved, and the carrier’s earlier attitude to its passengers – which seemed to regard them as a hindrance, rather than paying customers – was softened, with a more user-friendly website being pushed to the fore. “We looked at our business and said ‘right, we’re going to improve things here’, and we have,” Robin Kiely, the airline’s head of communications told PR Week in 2015. “It’s not just spin, because there are genuine improvements we’ve made.”

4. O’Leary opens his mouth

Many of Ryanair’s notorious shock tactics have been associated with Michael O’Leary, the airline’s cantankerous CEO – who has never been stuck for a phrase likely to attract headlines. Many of his utterances – from suggesting that passengers might have to pay to use on-board toilets to mooting the prospect of standing-only tickets which would allow the carrier to cram in more customers – have garnered acres of newsprint and a wealth of clicks. But his broadside, in the wake of the Icelandic ash-cloud farrago which saw planes across Europe grounded in 2010, took some beating. Furious at the thought that Ryanair might have to compensate passengers for a situation beyond its control, he said: “You’re not getting a refund, so f**k off. We don’t want to hear your sob stories. What part of ‘no refund’ don’t you understand?” European Union law disagreed with this opinion – and Ryanair had to cough up for the inconvenience dispensed by the volcano Eyjafjallajokull.

How the airline recovered

While still the airline’s chief executive, O’Leary has been pulled back from the frontline of Ryanair PR exercises as part of the “Always Getting Better” ethos. Perhaps, or perhaps not, coincidentally, the airline’s financial figures have been in the rudest health in recent years. Only this week, it announced a record profit of £1.14bn.

5. easyJet falls foul of anti-social media

Ryanair’s main low-cost rival has been less prone to PR gaffes, but it stumbled in September 2013 when staff refused to let a passenger board one of its planes after he was mildly critical of the airline on Twitter. Frustrated that his evening flight from Glasgow to Gatwick was delayed, Mark Leiser tweeted that he and a fellow passenger – a soldier – might be unable to find a train service from the airport once they landed. “Flight delayed 90min,” he wrote. “Soldier going to miss last connection & @easyjet refusing to help pay for him to get to Portsmouth.” When he eventually came to board, Mr Leiser said that he was picked out of the queue and told he would not be flying – with the warning that “you should know better than to send tweets like that and think you can still get on the flight.” He claimed he was only allowed to take his seat when he revealed his law qualifications.

How the airline recovered

The best response to a problem involving social media is… a swift response via social media. The following day, easyJet’s Twitter account sparked into life, contacting Mr Leiser with a message of “Hi Mark, we are sorry to hear about this unfortunate incident. NO passenger will be denied boarding due to comments made on Twitter. Please send us a DM [direct message] so that we can sort this out for you.” Somewhat cheekily, the Twitter team for Brittany Ferries jumped into the discussion with an opportunistic posting of: “Hello Mark, can we help you with your travel plans at all?”.

6. Qantas’s social-media “dream” becomes a nightmare

Australia’s national carrier also discovered that immediate online connectivity with your customer base can not always be a good thing. The airline chose November 2011 as the ideal time to ask would-be passengers to tweet their “dream luxury in-flight experience”. But the promotion occurred in the middle of a fraught period of cancelled flights and industrial action. And rather than be inundated with warm messages about fluffy pyjamas and double beds at 36,000ft, Qantas found its Twitter account swamped by the angry and the sarcastic. “Getting from A to B without the plane being grounded or an engine catching fire,” came the response from one Mark Colvin, with the tag “#qantasluxury”.

How the airline recovered

In true Australian fashion, Qantas played the furore with a straight bat. “We launched the #qantasluxury competition as part of our ongoing social media strategy,” a spokesperson commented. “The competition is giving away Qantas First Class pyjamas and amenity kits and a number of people have legitimately entered the competition. A large number of our customers were disrupted and inconvenienced by the recent industrial action and fleet grounding. However, services have returned to normal and our customers can book flights with absolute confidence that they will not be disrupted by industrial action.” Textbook. Website Traveller.com.au nonetheless summed up this ill-timed misadventure with the headline “Qantas makes hash of tweet campaign”.

7. Pakistan Airlines employees take the problem by the horns

An airline’s safety record is a crucial part of its viability. The best way to demonstrate air-worthiness is via flawless facts and figures. The worst is via the image of some of your staff conducting a superstitious ritual in the hope that this will help their employer. But such was the scene in the Pakistan capital Islamabad last December when Pakistan Airlines ground crew were caught on camera slaughtering a black goat next to a plane preparing for a domestic flight – in the hope that the sacrifice would ward off evil spirits. It goes without saying that dead farmyard animals are not a core part of the Civil Aviation Authority handbook.

How the airline recovered

It’s impossible to argue that this has helped the company’s reputation. Pakistan Airlines was swift to say that the incident was nothing to do with head office – a random act that had been orchestrated by the staff of their own initiative. But the killing was roundly mocked. “PIA sacrifices a black goat… they take their historical nickname ‘Please Inform Allah’ (PIA) seriously,” wrote journalist Fasi Zaka.

8. United we stand. Unless we haul you off screaming

The most notorious airline PR mistake ever? Little surely beats the sticky morass into which United Airlines sunk on April 9 via the forcible removal of a passenger from a full service between Chicago and Louisville. The carrier needed to find space for four crew members who were required in Kentucky the next day – but when no volunteers for disembarkation were forthcoming among paying customers who had already boarded, the unfortunate David Dao was randomly chosen and man-handled, screaming, from the aircraft. His whole ordeal was captured on cameraphone. United then compounded the situation by trying to smear Mr Dao, saying that he had been “disruptive and belligerent”.

How the airline recovered

There is a very real chance that it hasn’t. As the footage of Mr Dao’s treatment went viral, and outrage grew, United changed tack. The airline’s CEO Oscar Munoz issued a contrite statement declaring the incident “truly horrific”, saying that he was “disturbed” by it. Later in the month, it was announced that the airline had reached a settlement with the passenger for an undisclosed sum. But this was not before the company’s stock price had plummeted, and the matter had reached the ears of the White House, where press spokesman Sean Spicer called it “troubling”. When even the Trump administration thinks you have committed a PR howler, you know things are bad.

9. United gets its leggings in a twist

America’s (and the world’s) third largest airline was already on the defensive after a row over passengers’ clothing which hit the front pages in March. Two young girls were prevented from boarding a United flight from Denver to Minneapolis because they were wearing leggings – which a gate agent reportedly deemed to be inappropriate. “She’s forcing them to change or put dresses on over leggings or they can’t board,” a fellow passenger, Shannon Watts, reported on Twitter. “Since when does United police women’s clothing?”

How the airline recovered

See (8). This has been a bad year for United, even if it’s explanation – that the girls were “pass riders”, travelling on the flight as a company benefit, and therefore subject to a dress code – attempted to present meagre mitigation.

10. American Airlines has a balls-up over a buggy

If United can take one tiny sliver of consolation from its dreadful 2017, it is that one of its main competitors has also had egg – or perhaps a less pleasant substance – all over its face. Two weeks after David Dao’s traumatic moment in Chicago, American Airlines also failed to show its friendly side in San Francisco. As a plane was readied for a departure to Dallas, a row erupted between a passenger and a crew member over whether the former was allowed to have her baby’s buggy in the cabin. Cameraphone footage shows the crew member trying to seize the buggy, accidentally striking the woman with it, and narrowly missing her child. Then another passenger becomes involved, threatening to punch the flight attendant, who in turn challenges him to hit him. Thoroughly unpleasant.

How the airline recovered

Perhaps mindful of the deep bear-pit from which United was still trying to extract itself, American Airlines reached straight for the response manual marked “Sympathy and Understanding”. “We have seen the video and have already started an investigation to obtain the facts,” a statement said. “What we see on this video does not reflect our values or how we care for our customers. We are deeply sorry for the pain we have caused this passenger and her family, and to any other customers affected by the incident.”

Too much? Not a bit of it.

“We are making sure all of her family’s needs are being met while she is in our care,” the statement continued. “After electing to take another flight, we are taking special care of her family and upgrading them to first class for the remainder of their international trip. The actions of our team member captured here do not appear to reflect patience or empathy – two values necessary for customer care. In short, we are disappointed by these actions. The American team member has been removed from duty while we immediately investigate this incident.”

Yep – that should probably do the trick.