Even to a 13-year-old kid, it seemed like the classic story of a celebrity flying too close to the sun.īut this all changed when I listened to an episode of Malcolm Gladwell’s podcast “Revisionist History” titled “Free Brian Williams.” The episode explores the scandal in-depth but also offers an interesting explanation for William’s on-air inaccuracies. I, at the time, agreed with this interpretation of the story. Many - at the time and probably still - believed that Williams was making up the story to make himself seem like a bigger character in the story. The question of intention, though, is a difficult one to answer. The cardinal sin for any journalist at any level is to be caught making up a story, it’s something hammered into your head from the first day of journalism school. What Brian Williams did was clearly wrong. So I don’t think he didn’t remember that, I think he fabricated that.” The reaction from pundits at the time was strong and came from all sides, everyone from Brian Stelter to Rosie O’Donnell weighed in on the issue, with O’Donnell saying on The View, “I think you would know if you were in a helicopter that was actually hit by a missile. I said I was in an aircraft that was hit by RPG fire, I was instead in a following aircraft.” “I made a mistake in recalling the events of 12 years ago,” Williams said. In February 2015, Williams appeared on-air to retract the story.

RPG and AK-47.” And in January 2015, Williams offered a new interpretation on the Nightly News “the helicopter we were flying in was forced down after being hit by an RPG.”Īfter these appearances, the truth began to seep out from other veterans that Brian Williams’ helicopter was not hit by an RPG. In an appearance on the Late Show with David Letterman in 2013, Williams said “two of our four helicopters were hit by ground fire, including the one I was in. He clearly states “we learned the Chinook ahead of us was almost blown out of the sky.” Yvonne Tang / DFP Staffīut Williams’ recounting of the tale morphed over time. When Williams first reported the story in March of 2003 on Nightly News as a war correspondent, he correctly identified that he was not in the helicopter. On several platforms and for several years, he told a story that he had been in a helicopter that was hit with an RPG missile and was forced to land, which wasn’t true. You probably remember the scandal that caused Williams to be removed from Nightly News. Williams has been the host of an MSNBC show, “The 11th Hour,” since September of 2015 after he was removed from his position as anchor of the “NBC Nightly News.” Longtime NBC news anchor Brian Williams announced earlier this week that he’d be leaving NBC News at the end of 2021.

Who replaced brian williams