F**K You, says British Airways - apologizes for racial re-tweet

This is a perplexing case. British Airways was caught red faced in an ongoing Twitter faux pas in which the company’s officially verified Twitter account carried a re-tweet from a disgruntled passenger - well, accidentally, and in the bargain created a big turbulence in the social media.

It all started when @JaeLadd, posted a message to @British_Airways saying: “F**K You. F***n cancelling my flight”. And created a hash tag- #bunchofcu**ts. Now comes another shady twitter @AsianRonaldo, who adds an extra line to the original tweet by saying “Go back to your f****G country..you Gook! and this slangfest then was officially re-tweeted by British Airways twitter handle @British Airways to its 200K plus followers. All this happened on Sunday afternoon.

This is what you call a perfect recipe for a social media disaster!

While British Airways was quick to delete the tweet by saying, “Apologies for the last RT. We are sorry for any offence caused and are investigating how this may have happened”

The so-called racial re-tweet by BA officials manning the twitter account has been captured by another twitter user Louise Page ‏@louise_s_page - which was now the only proof of the faux pas committed by the airlines.But according to reports, there is a speculation that the BA twitter account might be hacked and that altogether brings different dimension of how BA can let that happen. But it is not yet clear whether it is hacked or not.

Big Embarrassment..

BA has always prided itself as a an iconic brand and this slur is a sure embarrassment and it is now on the damage control mode and reports suggest that an investigation is on its way and only its outcome will determine whether a BA official re-tweeted it or it was hacked and re-tweeted by the unknown hacker.

Yet again this episode exposes the dangers of social media and if proper controls are not in place, it can create a big dent on a company’s credibility. Going by a report by Brian LaSorsa in digitaljournal.com, he writes, “It seems the airline company has been gaining about 70 followers per hour ever since. Funny enough, British Airways was recently commended by Mashable for its social media presence."