A newscast about the investigation into the Ethiopian Airlines 737 MAX crash was censored at U.S. airports last Wednesday and instead replaced by a viral cake video.
Business Insider employees were at New York's LaGuardia International Airport when they saw an update on the investigation into the crash interrupted on the airport TV and replaced by a video from Refinery29 of a cake being iced.
While the video of the newscaster sharing the update was replaced by the cake video, the closed captions about the crash report stayed on screen during the video. The Business Insider employee overheard a passenger point out the censorship to another.
LaGuardia International Airport TV screens are run by CNN Airport Network which controls the TV networks across 57 airports in the U.S.
The clip of the Ethiopian Airlines crash update was not aired in the 57 airports, and no further coverage of the 737 MAX crashes will be broadcasted in these TVs in the future, as this is in line with the network's policy of not covering commercial aviation issues.
"It's CNN Airport Network's policy not to air programming or segments of programming related to any accident or incident involving a commercial passenger airline," a CNN Airport Network spokesperson told Business Insider.
They added, "Any programming about the Boeing 737 airplane that references or includes footage about the crash of Ethiopia Airlines 737, or any other airline disaster, will not air on CNN Airport Network."
Despite the relevance of such information for viewers, CNN Airport Network claims that airing footage of commercial aviation crashes and similar stories "would be inappropriate for a family-friendly airport environment."
A spokesperson for LaGuardia confirmed that CNN Airport Network controls the TV screens of their airport and they don't alter the network's content.
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