Yoo Jae Suk, Jung Joon Ha, and Park Myung Soo in the "Your Name" segment aired during the Jan. 21 episode of "Infinite Challenge." (Photo : YouTube/MBC Entertainment)
The reality-variety television program, "Infinite Challenge," recently came under fire for violating traffic rules during a recent episode. The show's production has now issued an official apology in the wake of the controversial driving incident.
During the "Your Name" segment of the Jan. 21, Saturday, episode of the show, cast members were shown driving in the opposite direction on a one-way street, which is a serious offence in South Korea. The traffic violation did not go unnoticed and sparked backlash from viewers, one of whom also filed a complaint with the Korean Communications Commission.
In the statement obtained by All Kpop, "Infinite Challenge" producers confirmed the traffic violation after reviewing footage from the episode. The production also provided an explanation about the events leading up to the offence.
"After checking the original footage, we checked that the car with the members entered the street in the blue direction as in the map below from the Imjingak Pyeonghoa-Nuri Park, and then left the road in the opposite direction of the one-way road as marked by the red arrow," the production said in the statement. "Only the car with the members went up to the upper parking lot of the Imjingak and all the other cars stayed in the lower parking lot, so the staff did not realize that the car with the members in it had driven in the opposite direction."
The producers' pointed out that the concept of the "Your Name" segment was to find new locations by improvising. Because of this, the driver made the mistake of reversing as he was not familiar with the location.
While the producers did explain the reason behind the driving incident, they said that there was no excuse for what happened and it was entirely their fault. The production also apologized to the viewers and vowed to be more careful henceforth.
This comes nearly two weeks after "Infinite Challenge" PD confirmed via a statement obtained by Soompi that the show would be going on a seven-week hiatus. The popular variety-reality show will be replaced by the new variety special "Forty's Spring" and the "Best of 'Infinite Challenge'" specials during that time.
Watch the controversial driving incident in the video clip below:
