The greatest F-bombs in New York broadcasting history
The NBC weatherman who dropped an F-bomb on air Thursday morning joins a long line of Big Apple broadcasters who have made similar gaffes.
In the F-bomb heard ’round the world, former NBC anchor Sue Simmons hilariously screamed “What the f–k are you doing” to her co-host Chuck Scarborough during a tease to the 11 p.m. newscast on May 12, 2008, seconds after she teased a story about grocery store prices.
The embarrassing but wildly entertaining slip landed her on the front page of The Post, where sources detailed her penchant for liquid dinners and a tendency to get tipsy before going on-air.
Simmons apologized for the cuss shortly after, calling the slip an “unfortunate mistake.”
Years later, she explained the slip and said her co-host was Googling things on his computer and was apparently not focusing on the tease, so she felt the need to aggressively get his attention.
In an even more cringeworthy slip, Fox News anchor Ernie Anastos accidentally said the F-word while bantering with weatherman Nick Gregory on Sept. 16, 2009.
“Keep f–king that chicken!” Anastos quipped while his co-host Dari Alexander froze and looked into the camera with a wide-eyed, horrified look on her face.
The two men tried to laugh it off, but Anastos apologized for the cuss the next evening, saying he “misspoke.” It’s believed Anastos was trying to say “Keep plucking that chicken,” a turn of phrase for “Persevere” or “Don’t give up.”
More recently, News 12 Bronx anchor Matt Pieper was caught making off-color comments on a live newscast in 2014, mocking people on welfare and saying the F-word, reports said.
The anchor said parents need to “do their f–king jobs and walk their little kids to school on their own, and not rely on everyone else, kind of like people rely on government assistance for their entire lives,” according to a clip posted to Mediaite.
He kept going, shocking viewers who took to Facebook to slam his comments.
The station later apologized and chalked the mistake up to a technical error.