Palarong Pambansa drone supplier apologizes for PH flag mishap; Marikina plans legal action
MANILA, Philippines – Disaster struck in the very last moments of the Palarong Pambansa 2023 at the Marikina Sports Complex as the closing ceremony drone show supplier mistakenly depicted the Philippine flag in a state of war, as seen on the city’s livestream of the final event on Saturday, August 5.
DroneTech Philippines has since apologized for the error, but the city government is nonetheless pursuing legal action against the supplier.
“The Marikina City Government under the leadership of Mayor Marcy Teodoro is condemning the mishap and is pursuing legal action against DroneTech PH to determine the company’s faults and the accompanying punishments and fines,” said a Marikina PIO statement in Filipino.
In the portion of the closing concert introduced by Teodoro himself, drones were seen forming different images while the Palaro 2023 theme was played in the background.
Right after the Philippine archipelago was formed mid-air, the country’s flag was depicted, but with the red portion distinctly on top, before again rearranging to show a warrior running, then the word PALARO, and finally, the word MARIKINA with an image of a shoe above it.
The sequence may be viewed at the Marikina PIO livestream of the closing concert around the 6-hour, 15-minute mark.
DroneTech admitted that it was not able to test and make corrections to the drone routines because of “severe weather conditions and signal interference” at the Marikina Sports Complex prior to the closing ceremony.
The first few days of the Palaro 2023 were indeed hampered by torrential rains brought by the enhanced monsoon in the flood-prone city, leading to multiple game delays and other difficult conditions for athletes, fans, officials, and media personnel.
“Moving forward, we will make sure to execute proper protocols in testing our future shows. The company is sincerely sorry for this unintentional error in programming,” DroneTech said in its own statement.
“As God as our witness, we have innocently made this mistake and have no malice or bad intentions on anyone – the people of Marikina and the Philippines as a whole.” – Rappler.com