The chief executive officer of Air Canada is facing heavy backlash for his speech on the fatal Air Canada Express crash that took the lives of two young pilots at LaGuardia Airport on March 22.
Antoine Forest, 30, and Mackenzie Gunther, 22, were both killed when the Bombardier CRJ-900 plane they were piloting from Montreal’s Trudeau International Airport crashed into a fire truck after being given clearance to land on one of the airways at LaGuardia.
The devastating collision that, according to early reports, appears to be a case of air traffic controller error — one air traffic controller had been navigating both air and ground traffic all day on Sunday — was both the worst Air Canada crash in decades and the first fatal crash at LaGuardia in 30 years. The other 41 passengers and crew on board survived but suffered injuries with various degrees of severity.
As the joint probe between American and Canadian investigators continues, Air Canada CEO Michael Rousseau posted a four-minute video in which he called the crash “a very dark day for Canada” and expressed his condolences to the families of the pilots.
“He should leave”: Air Canada CEO Michael Rousseau draws backlash over LaGuardia crash speech
The speech was entirely in English and, given the status of French as an official national language in Canada and Forest having been a French speaker from Québec, it drew immediate controversy from multiple political groups and members of the public; Canadian national broadcaster is reporting that 795 complaints about the speech were filed to the Commissioner of Official Languages over the last two days.
On the afternoon of March 25, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney told reporters that Rousseau’s message showed “a lack of compassion” while Québec Premier François Legault and Bloc Québécois leader Yves-François Blanchet called for his resignation.
“If he still doesn’t speak French, it is a lack of respect,” Legault said on Wednesday.
Related: Pilot killed in LaGuardia plane crash identified by family
After rising up through various leadership positions at Air Canada, Rousseau was promoted to president and chief executive of the national airline in February 2021.
Not long after, he became embroiled in his first language scandal for a 26-minute speech in Montreal in which he spoke French for just 20 seconds. At the time, Rousseau had been living in Montreal for 14 years and faced immediate questions about how he could live in a French-speaking province and lead a national airline without being able to learn even a few sentences in French.
Michael Rousseau has been president and chief executive officer of Air Canada since 2021.
Air Canada
As scandal over condolence video grows, Air Canada CEO summoned to Ottawa
Rousseau’s apology and explanation that he was more focused on running an airline than learning another language was not particularly well-received at the time but got him out of scandal at the time.
But given the tragic nature of the recent crash, Rousseau’s last speech has caused particularly strong outrage.
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“It’s not the first time, it’s not the second time, it’s the minimum the third time, game over,” Québec’s Justice Minister Simon Jolin-Barrette said of Rousseau’s condolences video.
The furor around the speech also caught the attention of Canada’s parliamentary Committee on Official Languages and Rousseau has been summoned to Ottawa to explain his speech given Air Canada’s requirement to abide by the Official Languages Act in the coming weeks.
Related: LaGuardia Airport reopens one runway after fatal crash