CASE STUDY: Successes and disasters in social media / Mira Koivumäki-Lindholm

CASE STUDY: Successes and disasters in social media

 

Who remembers this case?

Russia had just attacked the Ukraine and there was a martial law in the area. It was dangerous to fly over Ukraine's airspace.

So Finnair emphasized that none of its flight had not gone to Ukrainian airspace after the spring 2014.

One passenger took a picture of the planes flight information (Flight Radar) and spread the image to Twitter. That update raised confusion and people started to believe the opposite.

Iltalehti wrote: “Recently, at 23.15 the updated information, the Finnair flight AY1714 to Rhodes had flown over Ukraine."

During the next days people spread out more photos that were clear proof of the fact that Finnair is lying.

Finnair's Communications Manager claimed that Finnair has not flown Ukraine's airspace.

“By the company's decision we have flown through other routes since the spring”, Communications Manager Aku Varamäki declared.

Media and people kept asking: "How do we get this kind of photos from flight information then?"

“It is pure speculation. Site data is not accurate enough”, said Communications Manager.

Finnair announced on Twitter that “Earth's surface is sloped and Flight Radar does not take that into account. In reality, aircraft fly on Ukraine's western border.”

What went wrong?

Director of Communications

• did not clear the matter
• she defended the company's operations
• told outright lies
• even if people argued against - she held on to Finnair's position

That was really embarrassing and unprofessional!