Investigative producer Roland DeWolk, special projects producer Cristina Gastelu and producer Brad Belstock have been fired from the Bay Area-based news station that used racially insensitive terminology to identify pilots involved in the Asiana Airlines crash earlier this month.
According to a San Francisco Chronicle report, all three were fired after an internal investigation into the July 12 broadcast.
Three people died in the July 6 crash that temporarily shut down San Francisco airport.
During KTVU's reporting on the deadly incident, anchor Tori Campbell read the names of the pilots as -- Sum Ting Wong, Wi Tu Lo, Ho Lee Fuk and Bang Ding Ow -- not realizing that the names had been faked. Though KTVU has not said how the fake names made it to the teleprompter, they did blame the National Transportation Safety Board for confirming the phony names before they made it to air.
The NTSB said a summer intern had erroneously confirmed the information and was subsequently fired.
A former political editor for KTVU said that serious mistakes are bound to happen amid the high-pressure demands of running a daily local news program. "In situations like this," he said, "terrible mistakes happen that are bigger than one person. It's systemic."
