Who Had the Worst Week – 2025 Year in Review

Recessions and economic booms may come and go, but we were reminded again in 2025 that crisis communications is – and always will be – a growth industry. Below is a stroll down memory lane as we remember some of the disasters that defined 2025.

JANUARY 2025

• The L.A.-area wildfires in Palisades and Eaton caused an estimated $164 billion in damage.
• An understaffed air control tower at Reagan National Airport in Washington, D.C. contributed to an American Airlines flight colliding with a military helicopter, killing 67 people.
• A spectator was killed at a high school track and field meet on the University of Colorado’s Colorado Springs campus when a competitor lost control of a hammer in the hammer throw event and hurled it into the stands.
• Two Oregon men who set out in the Gifford Pinchot National Forest to find conclusive proof that Sasquatch exists died of exposure. 
• A Southwest Airlines pilot was removed from a plane and arrested for being inebriated as he was seated in the cockpit performing preflight checks.
• A former CBI DNA scientist who worked on thousands of cases, was charged with 102 felonies alleging that she manipulated evidence. Prosecutors identified more than 1,000 convictions that could have relied on her evidence, and an unknown number of cases may not have been prosecuted due to her faulty findings.

FEBRUARY 2025

• The Girl Scouts of Colorado warned that a King Soopers employee strike put millions of dollars of cookie sales at risk.
• Waffle House started charging a $0.50 surcharge per egg due to a shortage caused by an aggressive strain of the avian flu.
• The Trump administration banned AP reporters from the White House for reusing to use the term “Gulf of America.”
• President Donald Trump ordered the iconic Resolute Desk removed from the Oval Office for a deep cleaning after Elon Musk‘s son wiped a booger on it during a reporter Q&A event.
• Hyde Park Jewelers in the Cherry Creek Shopping Center was the victim of a slow-motion robbery that saw thieves steal $12.3 million in jewelry and watches over eight hours.
• Skype, the pre-pandemic king of video chat services, shut down amid competition from Zoom, Teams, FaceTime, Webex and Google Meet.

MARCH 2025

• More than 25 people were injured in South Korea when fighter jets participating in a live-fire drill accidentally dropped bombs on a civilian area.
• Boulder‘s Comprise PR filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
• The town of Amagansett in the Hamptons spent tens of thousands of dollars – $24,800 alone to an arbitrator – in an attempt to determine who stole a $25 gift card from a local elementary school. 
• University of Colorado regent Wanda James and her fellow regents argued about allegations she inappropriately used her public position to benefit the marijuana dispensary she owns.
• Tesla issued a recall for 46,000 Cybertrucks – nearly every one it had produced – due to a risk that its stainless steel panels can fall off. 
• Former Rocky Mountain News reporter Norm Clarke passed away.
• A United Airlines flight from Los Angeles to Shanghai was forced to return to the U.S. two hours into the flight when one of the pilots realized he had forgotten to bring his passport. 

APRIL 2025

• The Denver Nuggets fired head coach Michael Malone just two years removed from winning an NBA Championship.
• Actor Rob Lowe was not amused when a Beverly Hills sightseeing tour bus driver pointed him out to passengers as “John Stamos.” Lowe, who was on a sidewalk near Rodeo Drive, confronted the driver of the open-air bus and told him he needed to “Get better at your job.”
• President Donald Trump went to war with Harvard University after it refused to acquiesce to his demands on a variety of issues. President Trump froze $2.2 billion in grant funding and then asked the IRS to revoke its tax-exempt status as punishment for defying him.
• University of Colorado QB Shedeur Sanders, a projected first-round draft pick, slid to the fifth round in the NFL draft.
• The executive producer of “60 Minutes” resigned abruptly, declaring that pressure from executives at CBS parent company Paramount was undermining the show’s journalistic independence.
• Denver Broncos Hall of Fame quarterback John Elway was driving the golf cart from which his business partner and former agent fell and died.

MAY 2025

• The NFL fined the Atlanta Falcons $250,000 and Jeff Ulbrich, the team’s defensive coordinator, an additional $100,000 after Ulbrich’s son made a cruel prank phone call to University of Colorado quarterback Shedeur Sanders during the NFL’s draft. Ulbrich’s son took Sanders’ confidential phone number from a team-issued iPad that his father left unlocked.
• A climber had to be rescued a second time while attempting to summit Mt. Fuji after he went back up to retrieve the cell phone he dropped during the first rescue.
• Two years after taking lighter fluid and a match to billions of dollars in brand equity by dropping the name HBO from its Max streaming service, executives at Warner Bros. Discovery announced that it would rebrand back to HBO Max.
• A Colorado Rockies fan sued the team after he was hit in the eye with a foul ball. In his suit, he alleged that the team is so bad that it encourages fans not to pay attention to what is happening on the field.

JUNE 2025

• Gov. Jared Polis unveiled his “Bridge to Nowhere” concept that did the seemingly impossible: it united the political left, center and right in opposition.
• Boulder found itself again in the wrong kind of national spotlight after a hate crime targeting the city’s Jewish community killed one person and injured seven others.
• The former Dominion Voting Systems executive who sued MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell for defamation won a $2.3 million judgement, but it was Lindell who claimed victory after the jury only awarded the plaintiff just 3.5% of what was asked.
• A postal carrier who stole, filled out and submitted 19 mail ballots as part of a rogue plan to test the security of Colorado‘s signature verification process was sentenced to five years in jail. 

JULY 2025

• CBS parent company Paramount agreed to pay $16 million to President Donald Trump to settle his lawsuit against “60 Minutes.” Experts were certain Paramount would prevail in the suit, but noted that Paramount needed governmental approval for its plan to sell itself to Hollywood studio Skydance, which it eventually did.
• Sean “Diddy” Combs was convicted of transporting prostitutes. Combs was found not guilty on more serious charges, but he also faces more than 50 civil lawsuits.
• Chris Martin of Coldplay inadvertently outed a couple who apparently were having an affair.
• Jared Leonard, the Denver restaurateur known for the Michelin-recommended AJ’s Pit Bar-B-Q, was indicted on fraud charges for allegedly receiving more than $1 million in pandemic relief loans under false pretenses.
• Malcolm-Jamal Warner, best known for playing the lovable and charismatic son Theo on “The Cosby Show,” drowned while on vacation in Costa Rica at the age of 54.

AUGUST 2025

• ESPN officially cut ties with media analyst and former Denver Bronco Shannon Sharpe two weeks after he settled a lawsuit accusing him of rape.
• The annual Dragon Boat Festival threatened to leave Denver due to “dead fish, increasingly warm and shallow water, blue algae blooms, and a lack of filtration from untreated runoff” pouring into Sloan’s Lake.
• WNBA players endured a new trend of sex toys being thrown from the stands onto the court. 
• Former Colorado Public Radio host and reporter Vic Vela announced he was diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s disease. The diagnosis is the latest challenge for Vela, who has been open about his struggles with drug addiction and living with HIV.
• Retired New York Yankees Hall of Fame reliever Mariano Rivera tore his Achilles tendon playing in the team’s annual Old-Timers’ Day game.
• The Wall Street Journal reported that Nexstar, the owner of Fox31 and CW2, was negotiating to acquire Tegna, the owner of 9News. A deal has been reached and only regulatory approvals are needed to close the transaction.

SEPTEMBER 2025

• Evergreen High School was the latest Colorado school to experience gun violence. There have been 13 school shootings in our state since Columbine in 1999.
• Conservative political activist Charlie Kirk was shot and killed at a college event in Utah.
• President Donald Trump coerced ABC and its affiliate stations into suspending the late-night show “Jimmy Kimmel Live!“ after he and his followers objected to a joke Kimmel told related to Charlie Kirk‘s assassination.
• Winners of Publishers Clearing House sweepstakes learned the hard way that nothing is forever, not even “Forever” prizes that guaranteed $5,000 per week for life. The company filed for bankruptcy, and winners are no longer receiving their prize money.
• President Donald Trump defied decades of scientific research to declare a clear link between acetaminophen – the active ingredient in Tylenol – and autism. Adding insult to injury, it took President Trump three attempts to correctly pronounce “acetaminophen” during his televised press conference, even with whispered coaching from his subordinates standing behind him.
• Xcel Energy agreed to pay $640 million to settle claims that its transmission lines were partly responsible for the devastating Marshall Fire in Boulder County that caused an estimated $1.7 billion in damages.

OCTOBER 2025

• Legendary golfer and two-time U.S. Ryder Cup captain Tom Watson apologized to the winning European team after badly behaved and drunken American fans lobbed profanities and insults – and a few beers – at the European competitors.
• Members of the Trump administration lost their minds when the NFL announced that Puerto Rican superstar Bad Bunny would perform at the halftime of the Super Bowl. 
• A Gallup poll found that the advertising and PR community is viewed favorably by only 29% of the public, ahead of only the pharmaceutical industry and the federal government. 
• iHeartMedia went through another round of mass layoffs, and KOA NewsRadio morning host Marty Lenz was among those let go.
• Fox31 meteorologist Kylie Bearse shared harrowing details about a 69-year-old man who has been stalking her for more than two years, and her frustrations about not being able to get the Denver D.A.’s Office to file more serious charges.
• Colorado basketball legend Chauncey Billups was arrested as part of an FBI investigation into gambling and “sports rigging” operations linked to multiple mafia crime families.
• Tulane University banned Colorado Academy students from being considered for early admission because a single CA student reneged on an acceptance offer.
• Denver was the biggest loser on this season’s “Love is Blind” reality dating show. John Frank at Axios noted, “It’s widely acknowledged that the city has a horrible dating scene, and the show somehow made us look even worse.”

NOVEMBER 2025

• Fourteen people died after a UPS cargo plane crashed on takeoff at the Louisville, Kentucky, airport. 
• The FAA cut 10% of flights at the 40 busiest airports in an attempt to “alleviate the pressure” on over-worked air-traffic controllers during the government shutdown.
• The clear winners of election night in Colorado were progressives, tax increases and teachers union-endorsed candidates. The biggest loser? That would likely be Aurora City Councilwoman Danielle Jurinsky, who spent the past year parroting President Donald Trump‘s exaggerated claims of “gang-takeovers” of her city.
• Investigators determined that the password for the Louvre’s video surveillance system was “Louvre” when thieves stole jewels worth $100 million from the museum.
• Some guests were given only 10-15 minutes to vacate hotel rooms when the Marriott-backed chain Sonder unexpectedly declared bankruptcy. 
• The Wall Street Journal reported that the Colorado Rockies‘ GM position is actually the most coveted in Major League Baseball because it “is viewed as the sport’s ultimate sadistic challenge.”
• A Russian K9 police dog selected to perform the ceremonial pre-game puck drop at a KHL league hockey game successfully dropped the puck from its mouth and then promptly bit two players.
• Martin Bally, a senior executive at Campbell’s Soup, is no longer with the company after a lawsuit accused him of calling the company’s soups “highly processed food” for “poor people,” complaining that “f–king Indian” colleagues are “idiots,” and that the company’s soups use “bioengineered meat.”

DECEMBER 2025

• The University of Michigan head football coach was abruptly fired and then taken into police custody several hours later as part of an assault investigation.
• The Trump administration is abandoning the “woke” font Calibri in favor of Times New Roman. Secretary of State Marco Rubio issued a directive that blamed “radical” diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility programs for what he said was a misguided switch to Calibri during the Biden administration.
• Disgraced journalist Olivia Nuzzi’s new book “American Canto” sold only 1,165 hardcover copies in its first week on the shelves.
• Rocky the Raccoon broke into a Virginia liquor store, broke several bottles of whiskey, apparently drank some that spilled on the floor, and then passed out in the store’s bathroom. 
• A Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office SWAT sergeant resigned before he could be fired after being found to have responded to the Evergreen High School shooting incident while intoxicated.
• Pantone released its “Color of the Year” for 2026, and it was basically white. But because it’s Pantone, it had to give it a clever name, so technically “Cloud Dancer” is the color of the year.