On 29 Aug 2012, there was a false hijack alert of a Vueling flight from Malaga to Amsterdam Schiphol, triggered by “miscommunication”, which led to fighter jets being scrambled.We dive into how the crises played out online, in just 60mins. If you work in an airline or airport organisation and wish to download the slides, please email contact@simpliflying.com

1. Vueling Flight VY8366 False Alarm
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3. 14:22hrs Reuters Spain Tweets the news
This first tweet by Reuters did not mention the airline’s name, it just refers to a
possible hostage situation on a plane headed for Amsterdam and that 2 Dutch F16
fighter jets have intervened.

4. 14:35 The Associated Press tweets too
This time the tweet is in English and gets almost 600 RT in minutes. The account has
more than 1 million followers

5. 14:36 Vueling’s name is mentioned by a major paper
Just a minute after the AP’s tweet, one of Spain’s biggest newspapers tweets the news.
This time mentioning the airline involved. The account as over 1.7 million followers
and the message is re-tweeted over 1200 times.

6. 14:48 The airline denies the Hijacking, Offline
12 minutes after its original tweet the same paper reports that the airline has denied
the hijacking, mentioning the alarm was caused by miscommunication.
Unfortunately there is no on-line reaction by the airline at this time. The number of RT
is half that of the original news tweeted just 12 min earlier.

7. 14:49 the speculation starts
Once the news of the false alarm is confirmed speculation on the cause of the
miscommunication starts. The lack of English proficiency is one of the most popular
theories.

8. 15:00hrs - the first images
reach Twitter and a video
makes it to Youtube!

9. 15:10 the airline still has no
response on social media
Given the lack of reaction by
the airline’s account users
make fun of it. One of the
best example is this image.
The tweet says:
“meanwhile, in Vueling’s
twitter account…”

10. 15:12 Images
from inside the
plane are on
Twitter
As it often happens in these
situations, as soon as the
plane landed, and even before
the opening of the doors,
passengers had already
reached for their smartphones
and shared images of what
was happening inside.

11. 15:14 First reaction by the airline on Twitter
Finally, half an hour after its off-line announcement the airline posts a Tweet about the
issue. Unfortunately the tweet was only posted in Spanish, and without any of the
#tags that were being used by other posters.

12. 15:16 Second tweet from the airline
This second tweet informed that security procedures had been activated in
Amsterdam. But once again the tweet was in Spanish only and without #tags

13. 15:23 Third and the last tweet from the airline
Last tweet from the airline, this time ensuring the plane is safely on the ground and
following security procedures. Again Spanish only and no #tags.

14. How could Vueling have done better?
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15. 1. Tweeted at the same time as their offline
announcement
2. Used the appropriate hashtags, to get its message
across farther
3. Tweeted in English, and even Dutch to reach the right
target audience
4. Mentioned the key media outlets in their tweets, so
that they would Re-tweet Vueling’s messages
5. Collaborated with Schiphol’s social media team

16. Interested in learning how to deal with these
situations better?
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17. …something will be written here in Calibri 20
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18. contact@simpliflying.com 18
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