SMH Garuda story avoids naming its own dead and injured
For a disgraceful example of commercial imperatives at work, go to this morning’s story about Garuda in the Sydney Morning Herald.
Can we be clear about this.
Garuda has done a commendable job in configuring a truly comfortable Airbus A330-200 with only 222 seats and shaded many of its competitors with drastically improved service standards.
But the story glosses over that fact that this airline has been a massive killer of people for decades, and its past should remain up there in big flashing neon lights until at least several decades of exemplary behaviour have been demonstrated, rather than rehabilitated by a so called opinion poll for one of the most offensive displays of poor airmanship and flight safety standards seen in airline service.
The fact that one Fairfax journalist was killed in its most recent crash and another severely injured has been swept aside.
The report doesn’t even acknowledge by name the Australian Financial Review reporter, Morgan Melish, who was trapped by the legs and burned alive in the 737 crash at Yogyakarta in March 2007, nor Cynthia Banham, who was seriously injured nor the other Australian and Indonesian fatalities aboard the aircraft.
For the full circus of PR whitewashing to be applied to this airline, despite it putting in nice seats and good cabin crews, and then get deferential, let’s forget our dead and injured treatment by the Fairfax press, is nauseating.
How desperate is that company for ad revenue if it tramples over the recent past and the memory of its own employees, in such a manner.
The real story, told in simple English, should have been that Garuda burned one of our best to death, and mutilated another of our best, through its incompetent oversight of air safety standards, but hey, it’s now got nice cabins and Roy Morgan says Australian’s have voted it best in the world.
That’s the real story. That way Fairfax readers can come to their own conclusions about Garuda, and Roy Morgan.
This is part of Plane Talking’s earlier report on the Garuda rehabilitation.
Allow me to express my disbelief and disgust at Roy Morgan announcing that Garuda Indonesia, the national carrier, has been recognised as ‘Best International Airline for January 2012’ according to a recent independent survey of major airlines across the world.
Garuda killed one of my colleagues, Morgan Mellish, the Jakarta correspondent of the Australian Financial Review, on 7 March 2007, when he was burned alive inside one of its Boeing 737s in a crash at Yogyakarta, one of five Australians to die at the hand of an incompetent and negligent pilot whose presence at the controls reflects on the pathetic flight safety standards of the carrier at the time.
The other Australians who died were the diplomat Liz O’Neill, an AusAid official, Allison Sudrajat, and Australian Federal Police officers Mark Scott and Brice Steele.
A Sydney Morning Herald journalist Cynthia Banham was badly injured in the crash. Another 16 people, including one crew member, perished in the disaster.
The evidence presented at the trial and conviction on manslaughter charges of the captain, Marwoto Komar, in 2009, heard that he ignored 15 audible cockpit alarms before touching down on the runway at twice the normal speed without the wings having even been configured for a landing.
His ignored pleas from his co-pilot to go around. He was sentenced to two years jail early that year but his conviction was later quashed by a superior court.
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Simple. Do not fly Garuda.
Ben, I appreciate that you have a personal connection to some of those who were killed in the Yogya accident and that there is a very emotional angle to anything to do with Garuda. In the same circumstance I would probably feel the same way.
But it has to be said that at some point we must move on from the past. Garuda certainly has and it now complies with IOSA (initial auditing was done by an Australian company), while international assistance is helping to strengthen the Indonesian DGCA. Is there a lot more to do – absolutely, but to constantly refer back to the state of the airline five years ago doesn’t tell the full story of where it is at today.
As for your point about the SMH not naming the Fairfax journalists who lost their lives in Yogyakarta, quite frankly how is that relevant? The article did state that there have been a number of accidents in the past and even a direct quote from a pax that they were concerned that the aircraft fall out of the air. Do we really need to mention names every time there is an article about an airline? And if so, for how long? Should we have listed the names of all those victims of the Tenerife accident given its recent anniversary (an accident where the same dynamics were at play as in Yogya)?
Again, I recognise that there are emotions at work and would not want to belittle that at all, but the criticism you make of Fairfax as a whole is a little off base in my opinion.
Similarly, every story about Volkswagen should list the names of Jewish slave-workers; every story about Diageo should list the names of thalidomide victims; and every story about Dow Chemical should list the names of Bhopal victims. It’d be one way to increase word count, at least.
Ellis Taylor,
Would you mind elaborating on your comment about “the Tenerife accident … (an accident where the same dynamics were at play as in Yogya)?”
I am particularly interested in your analysis of the “dynamics”, so that I might understand your assessment of the similarities.
Wildsky, let me preface this by saying that I have not looked into these accidents for some time, but it recently came up in a presentation I heard from a QFI in the RAAF. In Tenerife, as the Captain started rolling the Flight Engineer on the KLM aircraft asked if clearance to take off had been granted, shortly before it collided with the other aircraft. The similarity with Yogya is the First Officer was pleading with the Captain to go around. In both cases the most senior officer on board was questioned and they chose at some level to ignore that challenge. That is where I see the similarities in the two accidents.
Ellis I think when you read Ben’s posts particularly on this topic, you have to remember that this is a blog, not an impartial news site, and Ben’s personal opinions tend to cloud what would be objectively reported in a “BBC news” sense.
Hello Ben,
I wrote that story. I am a freelance journalist and do not have any connection with the Fairfax advertising department. That piece was in no way compromised by commercial concerns. It was completely independent and ran as I wrote it.
It is a piece (among a number of others) in a column called Sky News in the Travel section of The Sun-Herald. It is specifically airline and airport news for the travelling public. The context is relevant. It’s about airlines. I write about all of them.
I do reviews, but I haven’t travelled Garuda for a long time. I had seen a lot of mail about their new efforts, etc, so thought I’d take it to the public to comment. Which is what the piece was.
I also appreciate sensitivities, which is actually why I didn’t just write a story around the press release, but went to some lengths to find people who have recently travelled with Garuda.
Fairfax did not and does not forget their dead and injured. I, as the columnist, certainly do not. But as a journalist with a very specific brief, I believe I did what was right within the context.
I could have named those killed and injured in that accident. I didn’t. So don’t condemn the whole of Fairfax. Condemn me. But please understand the context. That piece was not in a news section, not written for news. It was written to elaborate on a very specific piece of information about the airline for a very specific Sunday audience sector.
BTW if the comments that came back had been negative, I would have run them.
I’m happy to assist you with comments on any other piece of mine that concerns you.
All the very best and thank you for your interest.
Julietta Jameson
Many years ago I read sojme advice from a travel agent to never travel on an airline from a country where you wouldn’t be confident to drive yourself on their roads.
It seems like generally good advice, although I haven’t always managed to stick to it as work just books on whatever they can get the best deal with.
Julietta,
Thank you for your response. I accept what you say and I agree that Garuda has done some good things. However the criminally poor regard for flight safety standards shown by the airline at the time of GA 200, and the revelations made about the conduct of the flight, and the outcome in the court in Jakarta still hurt, very much.
Best regards
Ben
Thank you for replying Juliette.
Morgan was my brother. I have written to the SMH editor and received a reply indicating that my concerns will be passed on to the relevant people.
In case it is not passed on to you this is what I wrote:
Dear Editor,
I am the older sister of Morgan Mellish, a Walkley Award winning
Fairfax journalist who was killed on Garuda 200 on 7th March 2007 one
week before his 37th birthday.
Twenty one people died on that flight including five Australians who
were following Alexander Downer on a diplomatic trip. Cynthia Banham,
also a Fairfax journalist, was VERY badly injured.
Perhaps you didn’t know these details when you allowed this article to
go to print? Perhaps Garuda has improved since then? God knows it
couldn’t get much worse.
Whatever the case I would have expected the SMH to be a bit more
sensitive to the families of their journalists and the Public Servants
who died on a Garuda plane.
Sincerely
Lucy
Lucy,
Thanks for writing in. Like many who met Morgan ( I was an AFR freelancer for a number of years, and an SMH reporter for 21 of the years I have been a journalist) I’m still angry. I don’t think the story should have been published unchallenged either when the release was circulated on 7 March, or later.
With best regards
Ben
I seeth with anger that Marwoto Komar has probably been back in a cockpit for years. Can anyone confirm this?
Hi Lucy,
I am so, so sorry all this has caused you pain. I know your brother was a brilliant journalist and moreover, an extraordinary human being.
I did think of him, and Cynthia as I filed. But my job is to report airline news.
I would like to add I also would not have done that piece had I not been aware that Garuda have also obtained IATA Operational Safety Audit Certification. The changes have not just been cosmetic. In your question to the editor, you asked if they had improved. Reports suggest they have.
Which is all too bloody late for Morgan (which is the understatement of the century). And what happened was horrific and haunting. I am not defending them, I guess I am defending myself and my decision.
Bottom line is, I don’t like at all that I have hurt both you and Ben and probably many others. It kept me awake last night, which is nothing compared to the sleepless nights I am sure you have endured with what ifs.
It’s the shitty part of journalism, the bit in which you can’t take it back when you’ve hurt people in the process of doing your job.
I stand by the piece, but I am not proud of the terrible effect it’s had here.
All the very best,
Julietta
Ben: Garuda has learned the lessons, entirely reformed its business top to tail, and had made sure that such tragedies are, at least from its hands, are never visited on another.
They’ve moved on, and so should you.
thewinchester,
I was also asked to ‘move on’ and that it was ‘water under the bridge’ in relation to the Silkair suicide and mass murder at Palembang in 1997, and I didn’t. Especially when the carrier pursued the victims families with threats of legal action for not going along with the face saving cr@p that was used to try and paint over the realities of that accident.
It is possible to ‘move on’ when the airline that has killed your friends or your family, admits fully and publicly to all that this was a consequence of no safety standards and total management failure and a total, willful disregard for the safety of its passengers.
Moving on involves contrition and admission, preferably in a high visibility campaign. I am reminder of friends I have in the American Airlines of the past, and Delta, and the example of Japan Airlines, where the presidents and heads of the companies visited the homes of each and every one who had lost a child, a parent, a partner, and who have in many cases, funded endowments for the children of the deceased, or in one case, the education into adulthood of a young sole survivor of crash.
You kill people you express total contrition, you take whatever punishment the law applies, and you look at those you have so grievously affected in the eye, and you say how sorry you are. To everyone.
If it was your family, or your valued associates, it would a very cold hearted The Winchester that said, oh well, they’ve picked up their game, its time to move on. It is one thing to forgive a carrier for bad service, it is a significantly bigger ask to forgive for killing.
Ben,
Can we draw the same conclusion with other airlines? Korean Air for an example – used to have a thoughly shocking safety record until an very experience American came through the joint and cleaned the place out. Now they have a good reputation, but on your analogy should we all be waiting decades to use them?
mrsynik,
That’s a fair question and I did try to anticipate it in the post when I suggested:
QUOTE The real story, told in simple English, should have been that Garuda burned one of our best to death, and mutilated another of our best, through its incompetent oversight of air safety standards, but hey, it’s now got nice cabins and Roy Morgan says Australian’s have voted it best in the world. UNQUOTE
Garuda did not address the core issue to its victims, that of criminal negligence on its part. These are not matters to be lightly given up, but I agree that in time, they pass.
Had the story been written the way I would have written it, and I had strong editors with one exception on the SMH who always stood by me when I was Travel Editor, and I did write stories with that degree of candour, and I believe truly broke the mould in the 80s when it came to travel coverage, I would have gone on as indicated to question how Roy Morgan could rely on more than 1000 Australian travellers to rate Garuda, or anyone, as the best of anything.
How often did people fly it? How many other airlines had they flown the more than 10, 20 or 30 times needed to come to an objective comparison of Garuda and other carriers in comparison to Garuda? In my view, and I think it is a common sense view, it is nearly impossible to acquire enough flying experience of multiple brands in a reasonably short period of time to be knowledgeable enough to offer such a view.
There is a tendency in our times, to try and make the awkward disappear. It is a tendency I think reporters should resist, while acknowledging that you and other readers have raised fair questions. That we are having such a discussion means that we have succeeded in this task, and I thank you for assisting the process.
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