KTVU Prank Goes On The Air After Asiana Flight 214 Crash

One Of The Biggest Pranks In History

Asiana Airlines Flight 214 was a scheduled flight from South Korea to San Francisco in the United States. On July 6, 2013, the Boing 777 crashed while landing at San Francisco International Airport. During the final approach, the aircraft struck a seawall causing the plane to burst into flames. There were 307 people aboard and 187 passengers were injured with 49 of them having serious injuries. Unfortunately, there were also 3 fatalities, 2 at the crash scene and 1 person who died at the hospital. As you can imagine initial suspicions of foul play and/or terrorist attacks emerged but they were quickly discarded with reports of mistakes made by the crew. Every news station in the nation was after the biggest breaking news related to the accident and this is when it all happened. KTVU a television station serving the San Francisco Bay Area fell victim of a prank that will go down as one of the biggest in history. They reported on live television fake racist names of the pilots involved in the crash of Asiana Airlines Flight 214. The names were:

“Captain Sum Ting Wong”
“Wi Tu Lo”
“Ho Lee Fuk”
“Bang Ding Ow”

Here is the live report:

Soon after the report, KTVU released multiple apologies for the fake racist names. It gets more interesting. A “trusted source” who had provided accurate information in the past provided the list of names. The only difference is that this time he was in a joking mood. The report came from an NTSB (National Transportation Safety Board) official who confirmed the names. Eventually, an NTSB summer intern took the fall for the mistake and was fired.