Virgin Blue purges staff over blue movies

RICHARD BRANSON'S Virgin Blue airline appears to be having a porn problem down under.

Last month the airline conducted an investigation into a porn ring that was running on the company's network.

The investigation concluded that while you were waiting for your luggage to be delivered, the baggage handlers were watching and distributing porn using the perhaps appropriately named Virgin Blue network.

At the time management decided that a stiff warning was the best way of, er, handling the sticky situation. The problem was so endemic that if Branson started firing people over it then he would have no one left to handle baggage.

A month later, it turned out that some baggage handlers did not heed the warning and continued to play with X-rated material.

Now more than 20 of the staff and their managers at the Sydney and Brisbane airports have been sacked.

The airline said the staff were terminated this week after ignoring at least one warning about breaching the company's code of conduct regarding inappropriate Internet use.

Still, at least the first inquiry had managed to deter 20 of them, so the air carrier was able to carry out its porn purge without losing too many baggage handlers.

What Virgin Blue found most alarming was that some of its managers were present at the time and were also involved in viewing and swapping the hard-core stuff. µ