BY KEVIN KEYA
It is interesting that in the #ET302 tragedy (my heart goes out to all those affected), the Ethiopian Airlines has a better control of the story than The Boeing Company.
The response rate and interventions on the part of The Boeing Company have been anything but ‘too cautious’!
This hasn’t worked for them and their communication team seems unable to put forth a convincing position on the accident, yet they are at the centre of this global conversation.
When I first heard Richard Quest talk about the accident, I saw an opportunity for The Boeing Company to arrest the likely anxiety and speculation in light of the Lion Air crash late last year.
In the interview with Becky Anderson, Quest attempted to allay the speculation that the MCAS system could have been the cause of the crash.
At this point, a majority of the media reports and social media conversations were shallow on account of information.
It is a perfect time to own the story.
Whether it is true that the MCAS caused the crash or not, the most critical thing for The Boeing Company to have done was to take charge of their own story to avoid panic-grounding of their aircrafts.
Owing to Boeing’s reputation and years of excellence in aeroplane manufacture, I would like to give The Boeing Company the credit it deserves and I do not doubt their safety records.
But we cannot talk about safety when one of your newest equipment is widely seen to be unsafe.
It would be smart to first use all available technical reports and expertise to demonstrate safety of this particular equipment and restore the people’s faith in the brand.
This means confronting the current issue with facts and leveraging the safety history to calm the world. The Boeing Company must also empathize with Ethiopian Airlines and those who have lost their loved ones!
All said, accidents do happen and it could be anything that caused the #ET302 crash.
We can only hope that this doesn’t happen again. It’s so painful to lose lives like this.
Kevin Keya is Public Relations officer at Transcend Media Group