Qantas bulletin features plane crash
Nine News appears to have softened its controversial no plane crash policy for its 5am, Qantas-sponsored news bulletin.
The network came under fire this year after it censored the story of last month’s Air France disaster because the bulletin is also replayed on Qantas flights.
At the time a spokesman for Nine told Mumbrella: “We never report news involving plane incidents on Qantas inflight news bulletins.”
But this morning’s bulletin prominently featured the story of yesterday’s light plane crash in Broome. The plane was wrecked in the crash landing but all five people on board survived.
Mumbrella has requested a comment from Nine.
Tim Burrowes founded Mumbrella in 2008. He worked on Mumbrella until 2021. At various points he was editor, content director and editor-at-large. He returned to Mumbrella as Publisher in January 2025
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Years ago I worked on the KLM (Dutch Airlines) account. Although it had an unblemished safety record we could never mention it in advertising. It was considered bad luck.
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As I understand it – from one of the people responsible for organising the bulletins – the ‘no air news’ policy is still firmly in place. I guess someone was a bit sleepy and stuffed up.
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Glad I wasn’t flying this morning!
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This light plane crash story is unlikely to have run on the Qantas planes themselves (unless Qantas – who dictate content – made a mistake) because the “no plane incidents” rule is still firmly in place. The light plane crash was, however, acceptable for broadcast on television in a Qantas sponsored bulletin because the concept of light planes is so far removed from passenger jets.
Qantas trades in passenger jets, and so the Air France story would have reflected unfavorably on the industry as a whole and been at odds with Qantas’ obvious sponsorship of the bulletin. Light planes, on the other hand, are not the domain of Qantas operations and so there are no obvious negative parallels between the light plane crash and the services that Qantas provides. If anything, it is going to reinforce the concept of flying with Qantas being one of the safest ways to fly.
Given how much the Qantas contract is worth (both in monetary terms and the prestige it offers) it seems completely understandable that Nine would want to stick as strictly as possible to the (perhaps arbitrary seeming) guidelines put in place by Qantas producers.
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I am personally grateful for airlines not showing plane crashes in flight. I have anxiety when flying and who needs to see news that is going make you sicker at 30,000 feet.
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Hi Jimmy Van,
The 5am bulletin is usually the same one that also gets shown on Qantas flights. I can’t confirm whether that’s the case today (anyone been on an internal flight this morning?) as Nine hasn’t returned my request for a comment.
Cheers,
Tim – Mumbrella
I was comming back to Melbourne form Sydney on a Virgin flight. AS the plane was boarding the Sky news on show was completley devoted to teh Aid France Crash. Just what a nervous flyer likes to see just seconds before take off!
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It’s never been about neglecting the mention of crashes in general. Qantas neglected to mention the crash because Air France is a One World partner. The marketing and advertising industry unfortunately appears to have missed the point again.
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